Change

How much do we change in the space of a year?

Am I the same as I was last January

Or has circumstance shifted me into a new place?

Have I been open to argument

Or stuck steadfast in concrete shoes

Fitted by my younger self

Or worse still someone else

Who was convinced they were right

Without ever sitting down and giving it a good talking to

What are you, old boy

In your echo chamber

Are we in there together?

Viewing the same thing through a different lens

Can we both think again

Or at least be open to the thought

That things are more complex than they seem

And maybe we haven’t figured it all out just yet

Ask me again in a year

Thoughts

I was reading an article on France24 about the closure of the local Tabac’s in France and the rise of the far right. An image mirrored here in the UK. This poem is trying to move me on from my own sense of being right. It acknowledges how we change over time. I think that people are generally good even when they hold a different view point. How easily could I hold that same way of thinking had my circumstances been different?

Sign is in Paris. Well it was a long time ago when I took the picture.