Today, I took a stroll down Oxford Street;
being Sunday, it was swimming with shoppers;
at last, religion was out of the way,
and life reduced to a practical level.
I sat down to lunch at Pret a Manger,
having paid the set price, exact change given,
remarking how honesty made all things
possible, and its celebration there;
the street shops emporiums of principle,
decorous behaviour, fashion itself
principled to please in attractive forms;
children, with the easy movement of flowers.
The apparent exclusion of God’s presence
yet the greater realised in principle
held among the variety of nations
represented there, the dream of religion.
