“The Busker” – a poem by Robert Nisbet

August 11th, 2026

The Busker

The spitting rain of late December morning.
He settles to his pitch,
hacks and phlegms before scratching
an opening chord.

They pass by, smug families,
a few impassive singles.
He is singing McTell today,
The Streets of sixties London.

Michelle comes past, damped down for now
by another night’s abuse,
but Streets of London brings a memory
(a quick and unexpected chime,
like a knock on the lid of a buried treasure).
The school assemblies where they sang that song,
Miss Jenkin’s special class assemblies,
those coigns of mutual worth.

Passing an hour later, Richard is impressed.
He’s thirteen, has his first guitar at home,
admires this guy’s fingerwork,
has him up there with footballers.

And then the busker sings the boat songs,
Skye and Mingulay, Scottish of course, not Irish,
but Bridie (exiled after Londonderry
and the bomb attack) is caught by an echo
(maybe the catarrhal catch in the busker’s voice),
by memories of smoky ceilidhs,
the folk singers, the kitchen ranges,
the homestead, the heartland.

___

Robert Nisbet lives in the UK, in rural Wales, about as far as you can get from London, travelling West. His poems have been published widely in Britain and the USA, including regular appearances in San Pedro River Review, Panoply and Red River Review.

Watch a 1971 video of Ralph McTell performing his composition “Streets of London”