Follow the narrow cobbled one, between
the red yard door and the street light in
Portland Road. Where November stumbles over
walls and yards of memory, the time betrayed
purpose of the mangle and bath house,
webbed by dust and old spider haunts,
the ash door and its world unmade,
of paraffin fumes in wintery sculleries
musty smells, like old damp blankets or
threepenny bits sunk in apple pies.
Those back walls confirmed the soft flesh of life,
the heartbeat in the night and looking on,
as others searched the dark entries where
we waited, holding breath, to be discovered.