I picture you in someone else’s room -

In bed - a stranger’s ceiling overhead,

Awake in the gloom; feeling unfulfilled,

Cheerless and chilled by secrets left unsaid.

You’re wearing your usual man costume –

A routine face; average arms for regular embrace:

The suit you assume (crustacean casing)

For slapdash debasing and slipshod disgrace.

Whilst I, sitting at a damp train station,

Feel hollow, entombed within someone else’s sorrow.

Pale sensation: a girl cups a limp pet,

And, brimming with regret, holds it tight till tomorrow.