a poem about:

the midlands, a life of flats and rented houses,
hangovers dazzled by copper leaves
in post-industrial sunlight

music, and minor variations
on life,
a book of hours,
open on the page of now,
inscribed with every sparrow’s fall,
pasted with lilac emulsion,
stunned by the claims of affection,
alone in a house
on an early spring day,
watching the trees outside
painting a room lilac