Friday 1st August @ Commonwealth Games 2014 – Day 10

We were struck by Efficiency- the incredible one-way tidal flow of spectators snaking their way into Hampden, having walked in droves from Mount Florida station, being funnelled into barriers and then their airport-style security queues, out of reach of my Q-Poet permissions. 

I spoke to those waiting, as those who wait qualify for a gift in these line ups- and I met the man from Australia who had followed his daughter around for 5 years or more, with his wife- his daughter being the recent GOLD winner for Javelin.

As he draped me in the Aussie flag I didn’t know what to feel. There are so many flags on sale here in Glasgow this past two weeks, and so many more on display, what is one more flag? What I have enjoyed about the city’s boastful flag-fest is that the flag itself has become more fabric than a set of barriers to understanding, the flag has become more of a symbol of fun than fanaticism.

One young lady perched above the new arrivals in her Tennis-umpire podium throne, broadcasting queue instructions on the megaphone , read out the little scrap I’d handed her- an extract, “You could open any chocked dark door / with the blink of a hurricane eye,” saying, “this is for my admirers”. 

There are so many barked directives to those lining up, or those arriving, that sharing a poem would not reduce queue-induced tension but simply add to it, if it is in any voiced form. 

I have come to see though that the strength of this kind of work is in the quality of the interaction you have with folk, and the image  you speak and share, not the quantity of people you impose yourself upon. 

You don’t know sometimes the ripples your tiny little action can roll along…and like a butterfly kiss between two cheeks – close, blind and smiling – the lashes can stoke some flame.