Retrospection.     

Stealing my freedom, alone in the night.
Away from a place of lanes and markets,
small civic halls full of old wood and wool.
Small-minded murder haunts the same polite street,
where kids will rival the tales from the city, and do worse.

I go to the city. It seems like salvation, not a curse,
a place of hope where dreams and nightmares meet.
Caught in the open I feel like a fool;
it's only safe cos there are so many targets.
A storm of sound breaks against cliffs full of light.