My secret dream is
Holed up in the garret room
At the top of the house
Sipping tea and pulling faded fragrant volumes
From the shelves
Listening to them flap their pages
Like pompous old men or young revolutionaries
Throwing ideas and visions
To spin in the chimney smoke
Pressed, caressed into condensation on the window pane
Spinning records ‘round the gramophone
And waltzing in coattails
With a garrulous Emily or Anne, swishing her pink beaded cocktail dress
And laughing like crossed cups and the upset chandelier
Oblivious to the wheels of the world splashing past down on the asphalt
The babbling and blaring of wavelengths to and from satellites orbiting overhead
Cries of children, braying politicians, ringtones, deaf drones, construction zones
A noisy world without
A noisy world within
Which will echo, echo, echo out?
