John Levett
Bodywork
I saw a woman choking in a car
One stoned September evening by the park
Snarled-up between a street-lamp and a star,
Taut-faced behind the windscreen’s white Kitemark,
And knew her swallowed sobbing was for you,
For pills and vodka, perished rubber hose,
The unlaced derelictions of a shoe
Still swung from where dark stocking salts your toes.
Her grey wing-mirrored raincoat might have been
You second-hand and clapped out of your ghost
Still fumbling with torn patches of Rexine,
A childproof cap, a blue perm of exhaust,
Still high on hydrocarbons in the dusk
That filled the bodywork and set you free
To slip the seals, shake out the glass and rust,
And, with your brand new pain, inhabit me.
Page(s) 39
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