I went to bed with a wandering girl,
her dark hair shone with glints of moon
and we played at love in my room of red,
till midnight rang and the stars came down.
When we went to sleep I gladly dreamed
that we played at love in a room of green.

But in that dream I fell asleep
and dreamt we lay in a room of black,
then the black door opened and a man stood there:
It is my husband screamed the girl,
the one I've feared for seven years,
he's come to take my soul from me.

We woke at once in the room of green,
My soul has gone! she cried in fear,
then the green door opened and a man came in:
It is my husband shrieked the girl,
The one I've fled these seven years,
he's come to take my love from me.

And when we woke in the room of red,
she trembled as she clung to me:
O husband where's my lover gone?
I looked around, no word I said,
but rent her limbs with smoking hands,
then closed the door on that room so red.

The bus is full and thick with fug:
we’re all bundled up for winter. I take a hankie
from my pocket and wipe the misty window.
A young woman standing at a bus stop looks up at me
and I’m back in last summer’s Luxembourg Gardens,

where a young woman standing by a hedge
drops her jeans and underwear,
bends at the waist and grips her knees —
a long rope of urine shoots out of her in a glittering arc
and drums loudly on the lawn behind.
I look away, but later wish I hadn’t.

The bus stops and everyone get out:
old women who can raise storms,
children who can jump and count up to sixty,
men who know the name of the next winning horse
and smell of smoke, mums with covered prams.
I may never see them again, but their breath
is tucked in my pocket, soaking my handkerchief.