SHE SAID "AS LONG AS YOU CAN BEAR THE LONELINESS"

On the parquet flooring the breeze is low and cool,
curtains float above me on the scent of salt and sea.

I turn my head and think hurried thoughts
that lie themselves next to me in emptiness,
roll over and disappear, leave me to myself again.

The parquet flooring is warmer than some floors I have laid on,
its wood not quite dead having been flogged, drawn and quartered
before lacquer laid it finally in its bed, still toned red like my own blood.

I turn my head and think more hurried thoughts
that this time do not linger, but float like vapour trails of advertising
until their words despair of a reader and disappear, leave me alone again.

The flooring presses the metal studs of jeans into my flesh,
into the lacquered wood that lies beneath my palms,
but I cannot move for the loneliness that movement might stir.

I turn my head, raise a foreign hand to brush the hair from my eyes,
shift, and the spell is broken. A siren sounds outside,
and sadly I am no longer alone.