The BBC have produced a beautiful and sad documentary to mark the seven year anniversary of the London bombings: One Day in London. This terrible event has personal resonances for me, as I was living, as I do now, in Aldgate – site of one of the three explosions on the underground.
This poem, written to mark the anniversary, is a simple relineation of the Home Office report of the Aldgate bomb.
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Eight Fifty
CCTV images show the platform at Liverpool Street
with the eastbound Circle Line train alongside
seconds before it is blown up.
Shehzad Tanweer is not visible
but he must have been
in the second carriage from the front.
The images show commuters rushing
to get on the train and a busy platform.
Some get on, some just miss it.
The train pulls out of the station.
Seconds later smoke billows from the tunnel.
There is shock and confusion on the platform
as people make for the exits.
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Tom Chivers 