Then they'd haul the cage back in, with its catch of miners
dredged from the mountain's cavity. Even their eyeballs were black,
see - they'd look like buried men dug back from coal hells
to return in silence to villages of wives and children.

Smoking kills say the scattered packets of Lambert.
But, we live squeezed between hollowed monoliths, lurking
along roads clogged by town after town. If this
air that tastes of roof tiles doesn't kill us;
if this damp, that keeps us damp until
the rain returns, doesn't kill us;
if the pressure of each person's personal slag heap
weighted with history doesn't crush us
then we'll risk a cigarette more
then laugh harshly at nothing
then risk another.

You always knew a miner's age by his spit:
how it stunk of the pit, and stuck to any surface like a scorch.
The colliery path was black with it. It seemed a miner's lungs
were just inexhaustible seams of dust that he heaved around his neck.

The sun never makes it past the mountain ridges into the vein
we've scratched out, down below the light. This valley is a varicose scar
of terraced housing, dwarfed by rock and heritage.
If this shadow-mine hasn't hidden us completely
then we've buried ourselves
in the catacombs of coal around us, leaving only bodies
to spit at emptied bottles. If the world
is fresh and bright above us
then first we smoke another cigarette
then we lose the breath to climb
then we lack the strength to crawl.