Henry VI's Hidden Windows

Girl who lived here before me

I will recognise you by the assembly of smells

I have collected in crumbs and traces

The shadow of your hair in the heart of pillows

The print of your toe behind a twisted lip of carpet

The bruise of your fingers in the gum of the desk

The stain of your breath on the wardrobe mirror

Crumb by crumb I am trailing you

so that when we meet I will touch

your hair your feet your hands and mouth

and tell you where you used to live

You will be amazed as if I were

a street magician.

Sleeper

Leaner and less greedy than Philby and co.

he meets me at a place we're both familiar with.

He's hard to recognise from his passport photo,

still easy to locate for such a xenolith:

Toshiro Mifune's beard and teeth,

Pat McGoohan's turtleneck and jacket -

an eyepatch would suit him, or a scar just beneath

the cheekbone.

He sits sheltered from the racket,

hands on a book, eyes on the clock

(those eyes, at 51, only just going,

so getting used to glasses, though his usual look

- the Dutch cigar and single malt, the throwing

glances like torn tickets through the thick smoke -

very much in force). My ears are keen,

since I owe him them – and I remember last time we spoke

when our mutual mistrust led to a scene.

His information's detailed. Diagrams and blueprints.

His opinions well delivered. I sift through,

murmuring approval. We're a couple of skinflints

when it comes to compliments. It's also true

that we are not known for our dangerous capers

and we're not the most efficient of war cabinets.

He's quick to knock ash on the secret papers

and change the subject to the Plantagenets. 

Lean, Vain, Green, I staggered

up the steps of breath that chain

my mouth to your star-swelled areola

I found your tremors, and I answered:

Raise me beyond just the Santa Maria,

take me all the way to America

And sweet-tart,

join me on the lawn with homemade citron pressé,

smell my mother's Himalayan honeysuckle

Let your body

blind me to the bodycount,

my vision of the afterwards,

where I smother the memory-bouquet

with my rancorous heart, long

after the wedding, and

go through the forest, seeking

the pagodas that mark

each arrowed night's ashes

Strike out these visions

of crows over wheatfields, I want you.