The Sleepout

I danced in the long blue room
with the mullioned windows
all those diamonds
it was space rescued from the outside
or the other way round
the boards gave with each tread
to spirit me up   I felt a little closer to
heaven dancing in the long thin blue room
where the old artist had worked
it still held its air of studio-raptness
the air glazed or tinted
the way that mildest eyes can look
like words on emptied tubes of paint
she had nursed her mother to her century there
she had nursed her mother
until the letter from the queen
floated in the hall
there was a dark garden   the sky darkening behind
the glossiest leaves of two camellias intertwined
down the side was a shell-encrusted potting shed
a place imploding back to mineral
but filled with a hum of past industry
seeds from lost packets pushed up there and thrived
though we left before we knew all the names
years later when I dream of the place
what comes is not the blankets of night-scented Jessamine
but the sea air
smelt like a colour
from the open car window
a fold   I am not born
in the long blue room
she lifts the brush
outside a hand pushes shells
into wet cement
deafening time