Poetry - Remembering the Nineties by Kevin Higgins

Our hair got smaller and the TV went on
forever. We waited
for the Stone Roses' second album, or watched
Party of Five. In Washington,
committees gathered to frown
at what had gone on in the President's trousers.

Northern Ireland paused for
what would eventually become
a fully formed thought. Rwanda
was a machete with names on it,
that sounded nothing like ours.
We protested French nuclear testing by
sampling South African white
wine's new found innocence.

Osama bin Laden was a rumour
no one believed and Saddam Hussein
an occasional burst of stomach acid
up the oesophagus. We could board planes
without anyone having to see us naked
through a machine first, and made our No
to apathy heard by not bothering to vote.

While we planned trips to places
we couldn't yet pronounce, politicians bickered
about the Romanians begging on Shop Street.

History was in the bathroom
putting on her new face.