Bonfire Night in Salford

November settles over Pendleton,
On wet pavements and the backs of terraced houses,
Where smoke hangs low above the garden walls,
And distant fireworks disturb the evening,
Like something breaking in the ordinary dark.

The children gather round a borrowed fire,
Their faces lit by orange, shifting light.
A Catherine wheel spins briefly on a fence,
While damp wood struggles underneath the flames,
And somebody complains about the rain.

Across the Irwell, rockets climb and burst,
Their colours trembling briefly on the water.
The Quays reflect a thousand broken lights,
While traffic crawls along the wet dual carriageway,
And buses carry tired people home.

There are the usual bangs behind the shops,
The smell of burning cardboard in the air,
A neighbour watching from a bedroom window,
A radio playing somewhere out of sight,
And washing left too late upon the line.

By nine o'clock the streets are almost empty,
The bonfires reduced to smoking heaps of ash.
A spent rocket lies beside the kerb,
Its cardboard body soaked with November rain,
As if the night had never happened here.

We close the curtains against the cold,
And listen as the final explosions fade.
Tomorrow brings the bins, the work, the bills,
The same old streets beneath the same grey sky,
And another year before we light the fire.