One Night Stand

Awakening
amidst the devastation
of last night's degeneracy -
spilled alcohol
unsmoked grass
and beside her,
a stranger
she will never see again.

She rises
to stare through hazy glass
seeing no beauty
in decaying leaves
and sodden trees -

there is no garden.

He says nothing,
barely seems to notice her
although he pauses a moment
to look at a framed drawing -
one of hers - as together
but apart, they close the door
on the holocaust.

Sitting on the tube
he talks of crossword puzzles
until he reaches his stop -
see you, he says,
before his seat is taken
by another stranger as
the tube lurches on
through the endless tunnel.

Her abused body aches,
her mind in confusion -
up, down, across
like one of his puzzles;
only nothing fits.

At Marble Arch the escalator
climbs steadily upwards -
she stumbles at the top,
recoils as a man's briefcase
brushes her leg...

adjusts her eyes to the daylight,
city sights and
sounds, loud and louder;
people hurrying,
fast and faster;
concrete greys, no colours

and no garden.