I have not bummed across America <br />with only a dollar to spare, one pair <br />of busted Levi's and a bowie knife. <br />I have lived with thieves in Manchester. <br /> <br />I have not padded through the Taj Mahal, <br />barefoot, listening to the space between <br />each footfall picking up and putting down <br />its print against the marble floor. But I <br /> <br /> <br />skimmed flat stones across Black Moss on a day <br />so still I could hear each set of ripples <br />as they crossed. I felt each stone's inertia <br />spend itself against the water; then sink. <br /> <br />I have not toyed with a parachute cord <br />while perched on the lip of a light-aircraft; <br />but I held the wobbly head of a boy <br />at the day centre, and stroked his fat hands. <br /> <br />And I guess that the tightness in the throat <br />and the tiny cascading sensation <br />somewhere inside us are both part of that <br />sense of something else. That feeling, I mean.<br /><br />Simon Armitage<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/it-ain-t-what-you-do-it-s-what-it-does-to-you/
