Margaret Speak
Possibly
She had intended catching the earlier bus,
but distracted by the flash of scarlet
behind the plate glass, she paused.
Her eyes ranged over the display
clothing impossible models, limbs
arranged in improbable angles.
In the half-light at the back,
other figures with manicured faces
thrust their thin lips forward.
She knows real women
are more cushioned than this
and smiles at her shady reflection.
She looks less meaningful, imperfect.
The clock in the market place
struck five forty five.
She turned and her feet
picked up speed, took her too late
through to the bus station.
The stand, numbered twenty seven
now empty, but red tail lights winked
from the bottom of Church Street.
Later, people remembered her
sitting on the small slatted seat, waiting.
The next bus, delayed by a minor
collision, made up lost time.
The driver recalled a lone woman,
whose stop was Abbey Green:
in his mirror she crossed the road.
The last person to see her
did not answer the appeal,
did not tell anyone how her eyes,
wide like a mannequin, fixed
on his face as she drowned
in a ribbon of blood
from her open throat:
how her limbs fell into
improbable angles as he wiped
the blade of his knife across her coat.
Page(s) 102-103
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