Liz Atkin
Closed
I try to imagine her body
understone pale with whalebone
bunkered away below the pavement
on the seafront promenade,
twelve steps down and round
onto sandy mosaic tiles.
Her attendant’s door never replied
and she was rarely seen
due to dense nets and kettle steam
blurring a gas fire smudge
and budgie blotch of colour.
It must be so silent now,
no thump and slam of cubicle doors
fastened with brass bolt slide,
the rustle and sigh,
the dribbling streams that became
a roaring flush - just the sound
of the sea lapping up the bowls
and beetles cavorting in the tip saucer.
At night a urine yellow light
still seeps up through
the thick glass blocks
cordoned off by wrought iron work,
and I think she’s down there,
sealed in by slapdash breeze blocks
that are fronted with
a rusting grille primly
clutching its padlock handbag.
Page(s) 34
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