Two Fareham Mornings
You wake up on a floor, the landscape
is strange:
you feel like the ceiling has been studded with stars,
but you are inside. The terrain is littered with bottles,
cans, cigarette packets, spilled ashtrays—people.
You are the only person awake. There are no clocks
in the house. You quietly leave by the back door and walk
through the garden. The broken back gate takes you
into an alley. The sleep shrouded morning moves you
as though you were fragile. The world is light-headed,
perfect. The alley opens out onto a road: white church
rising out of columns of mist. You are in the presence
of an angel. You check the time on the church clock, 5 a.m.
Graves have huddled together through the centuries for
support. There are bodies of people under the ground.
You return to the house, encrusted with memories.
Quietly you sit in the kitchen and eat.
* * *
The room is dark and you can hear breathing.
The blankets
are heavy. You have seen this room, it is always dark.
There is a mountain range of furniture; piled boxes, heaps of
clothes. You are trapped in a network of shadows.
The body next to you has no owner.
You are scared into silence.
