1
Behind the party wall, the carpets
Stretch and shiver,
Stiffly lush with dark, dark colours,
Like a clearing in Eliana’s jungle -
At first, they are fat from the storm,
Then mildewed and cobwebbed
Whenever the sun sets.
Every night, unsleeping,
She rehouses flowers and books -
At first briskly,
Lit in her library a sombre, sickly orange
By the streetlamps,
Then she moves more slowly,
When the waking moon and planets
Tug at her thighs, while
The clocks tssk and tusk their slouching zigzag way
Towards the promise of a faint dawn.
Behind the party wall,
Despair and joy are mysteries.
Eliana pokes at piano keys -
Sometimes, she sings a shrill lament
2
To drown the funeral cadence of dustcarts,
Those tumbrils with their creaking rumble
Over mossy cobblestones.
The flowers bend to her will, as flowers do.
She fusses and sets them out symmetrically.
Lilies lean forward, gap-tongued, compliant,
Open to any darting hummingbird, abandoning
The disdained and furious roses, still
Blood-red with outrage at being strip-searched
Of their leaves, when
Their thorns offered no protection.
Behind the party wall,
The fireplace flames have died.
The years have flowed faster than on our side,
Like the city rain herding fallen leaves
Towards the black iron gratings,
Then downward , to fatten
London’s hidden rivers.
Eliana no longer struggles
Against that ruthless tidal flow.
3
Her books rustle and mutter, asking
As they await their turn:
What will it be tonight?
Alphabetical? By title,
Or by author?
Perhaps by heft, or weight?
Behind the party wall,
The dancing stops each nightfall.
Eliana’s secret sicknesses surface
In sad shifting dreams,
A fairground mirror maze of memories.
On this anniversary night,
She chooses height to rank the books.
Her irises flicker behind ghost-grey eyelids.
Fingers slide, feather-light over the upper lips.
She pulls at every shipwrecked publication.
Old pamphlets and new poems are relegated,
To join renegade crosswords and ronin sudoku.
How they sulk at their downgrading!
Unread remaindered biographies groan,
Sated, indigestible , and sneer
At obese encyclopedias, such unwanted companions.
4
Behind the party wall,
The books rejoice at their immortality,
Yet each page is haunted by the memory
Of branches, bud and bark.
Behind the party wall,
The flowers are ablaze in their brief moments,
But neighbours no longer call
Behind the party wall.
*****
David Allard – retired, still boisterous. Has written poems, short stories and two novels. Has been published in Poetica, Arc 30, WriteTime, Audio Arcadia, MTP and Salem. Born and bred in London.
