The meeting has run on.
It’s late, he’s lost, a little bit.
I offer that I’ll walk him to the tube
I lodge near here, it’s on my way.
I say It’s great, this route –
it takes you past a flower stall
that’s packing up this time of night.
They flog their stock so cheap it’s practically free.
He holds on while I dither picking daisies
marked at 50p a bunch.
A man sat by the stall is knocking back a can.
That’s Loz I say. His dog is Rosielove.
He told me that his wife fucked off
but he stays here, necks Woodpecker
which takes him to a sweeter place.
Rosielove is champing at a pigeon on the kerb.
Where d’you stand on city birds? I say.
Rats on wings with feet like spat-out gum?
Or do you like their blushing backs of necks
and wonder where it is they lay their eggs?
Pigeon pairs are roosting on the station roof.
At the entrance
underneath the moon and planes in tiny triangles of sky
he could kiss me as a scrumper steals a plum.
See these lips, would you not say they’re like the hips and hawes
that fruit in hedgerows when the winter’s coming on?
The street is all corners and shine.
Traffic stutters on the clutch
where people wait to cross the road
and each belisha flash is like a flower
picked apart to calculate
if love is true or not.
