A Story: “This Pen” – 14 April 2014
This is a story of what happened to me when I landed in London nearly a month ago, the first of of many I found there.
This Pen
I got this pen at Heathrow,
trying to get through the
humidly uncomfortable line
that always seems to exist at
crowded Customs counters.
I was to fill out the entry form
the stewardesses—
sorry, flight attendants—
give you when you’re
“ten minutes out” from your destination
but still jostling through
the lingering effects of
low-altitude turbulence
in a holding pattern
high above
the runway, down which
we were to taxi.
I brought that rumpled form with me,
still blank,
into Terminal 4.
This guy—
an American, white… Mid-forties, maybe?—
gave me this one, and said
(not in these exact words but
pretty close)
“Keep it. It’s just a forty ‘p’ pen.”
Yeah. He actually said forty ‘p’.
I remember that part.
I also remember thinking
he was a tool.
This entry was posted on April 14, 2014 by chucktowner. It was filed under Writing and was tagged with free-verse, London, poetry, stories, travel, Writing.
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