In The Shadows

In the all-night cafe off Union Street,

Where sweatshops, offices, and flats compete,

There’s a shadow world below the city’s beat,

A place to gather, where the night folk meet.

When the day is done and your shift’s complete,

Or an early brew, dark, and hot, and sweet,

On the way to work through the winter sleet,

You cup your hands and stamp your feet.

In the steamy sauna of the café’s heat

With a clientele of a select elite:

Porters and posties in the window seat,

Binmen, busmen, and a bloke from Crete,

Who drinks his Irish coffee neat,

calling “Bon appétit!” with a drunken bleat,

To the Kurdish cleaners in quick retreat

A cop in the corner, too indiscreet,

As familiar faces from the custody suite

Swap the same old stories over eggs and meat.

It’s a grim existence, neither trick nor treat,

But these weary workers won’t concede defeat.

They’ll never be an asset on the balance sheet,

But they roll the wheel that never completes.

And follow their friends to the midnight feast,

In the all-night cafe off Union Street.