Sunday,

You are the little apocalypse
in every week
The small death
set to the scent of roast dinner

You are the worst day
for worriers

Scholars and sloggers
sport sick stomachs
feeling five days’ weight
on slumped shoulders
pre-playing the pitfalls ahead

Forward lookers fret
while backward glancers
count missed chances
in their weekend window

Sunday,

Where the present-dwellers
lounge in slippered feet
whiskey-sipping, daytripping,
relaxing, basking
in a day of rest

While the rest of us
grimace in the vice
Stuck tight between
wasted time and
the production line -
the treadmill
and the trampoline
That it’s now too late
to jump on

Sunday,

you are the nostalgic dread
the post-pubescent hangover
the associations accrued,
Pavlovian,
over decades

You are the ominous opposite
of Friday night
morbid mother of the septet

You are the heinous host
of that deep down dread

that says:

‘it’s time for bed’