With just enough light in the sky to take out

the newspapers of yesterday

and arrange them, padding in

the galvanised bin;

smoke twists

in a neighbour's garden -

I cup hand and call,

remark upon the vagaries of the weather

and the recent tree

felled on Cobb Hill.

 

In response I get a half-turn

and shoulder shrug, grunt

of some approximate affirmative,

and the trudge on bitten concrete

as painted door swings

clicks closed.

I breathe in the settling embers,

arms akimbo, glance to my own,

palm-shadowed indoor.

 

On a locket on the counter

the liquid lurks like summer scent,

but splash it on and I'm burnt

by the cold slip of human heart.

It's him, and it's me,

a day sterilised, caught and labelled;

we're both hung out like the washing

on a dew-flecked

morning line.