Paint

Every Thursday, swinging a can of creamy matt white,
a
sloshing pendulum on a knotty rowan-branch arm,
I go to Aunt
Lizzie's. She lives by herself,
across the railtrack, watering
her cacti,
scolding her cats and finding new, secreted
boxrooms
for me to paint. I think she's
lonely.

Earphones crackle. 'Kid A'
sputters
in my autumn leaf ears. I pretend to
paint
the sky with my brush. Aunt Lizzie will ask
me
to give it a new coat soon, I'm sure. I never
hear
the squeal of steel on wheel on steel, that
she
will later, through sobs, say deafened
her.

The dented can spins
like Heero's
steam-powered whirligig.
Splashes
of paint on
buffers.