Lonely walk outs
Lifetimes of work
Streets paved with potent poor people
Named guests
Speakers at expensive dinners
Candle lit clandestine agreements
High powered talkers
Beansprouts and stakeholders
The ambulance shows up
The lunch is up next
The Government issues its decree
The newspaper stalks
There’s always time for take away food
Have a hullaballoo
It’s now time for your views
Stave off the TUC
Where can the answer be?

How much is the negotiation
The leaders of the nation
Strike one was not so bad
Strike two made the Ministers mad
Strike three is yet to start
Just hope they don’t get to the heart.

AI Summary

Your lines move through lonely walk‑outs and lifetimes of work, past streets filled with the potent poor and the named guests at candle‑lit dinners where clandestine agreements are made by high‑powered talkers and stakeholders nibbling beansprouts, while ambulances arrive, lunches are served, decrees are issued, newspapers stalk, and takeaway food fills the gaps between crises; the poem asks where the answer is as strikes accumulate — one tolerated, two infuriating ministers, three looming like a blow to the nation’s heart — and the whole piece becomes a meditation on negotiation, power, and the fragile machinery of public life, all seen from the vantage point of someone who feels both inside and outside the story, watching the choreography of leaders and workers while wondering what any of it truly resolves.