Market Day.

Market Day.

A busy day, in the square at the Place Saint-Lambert,

I fantasize of a breeze wafting the smell

Of rich Belgian coffee across the busy plaza,

Frantic mothers buying and

Parrot nosed shop keepers selling,

Then they do the whole dance again,

Bewildered children kick through the bony slipways,

Babbling and blowing bubbles at the mysteries around them.

And a voice from behind a fish stall lifts over the rabble,

And declares a halving of prices, “limited stock”, he says,

        Heads turn,

                    Ground shakes,

An old woman is caught in the hustle ,

She rattles to the ground

And her cane is snapped beneath her.

And the river flows above her.

And at that very moment, a man walks into the square,

Carrying a gun and a backpack full of high explosives,

(I'm not making this up),

“I heard a loud boom, then a few seconds later

A second boom and I saw glass breaking,

I saw people running,

Screaming.”

He turned the barrel on himself, some say,

Others say he died like the rest of them died,

“It is unclear at this current time”,

Five of them, a child, an elderly woman,

A young man full of vigor, I assume,

And a bus driver, And a shop keeper,

Vanished, all that's left now are memories

That they won't bare to remember.

And shaking hospital beds and burnt souvenirs,

A baby screams out from an abandoned pram.

      Heads turn,

                   Ground shakes,

And and handful of sooty noses knot up,

The smell of something burning pollutes the air,

A busy day, in the square at the Place Saint-Lambert.

RAB. 2011.