Always far from where you need to be,
you pull the white wood door,
take off Monday at dawn.
You call from another hotel,
just in from a meeting,
about to hurry to dinner,
some place,
near Pont Neuf.
My turn to speak,
what I can’t condense, I keep.
Night quiets the children,
rouses the house.
Tapping in the attic,
chimney sighs,
whine of pipes
Pillows bisect the bed,
I don’t want to roll into the cold.
Dull footsteps on the stairs -
next door -
the sound of someone switching off a light.
Sinéad Griffin has been published in Poetry Ireland Review, The Irish Times, The Marrow Poetry, The Honest Ulsterman, Abridged and elsewhere. Her work featured in the Poetry Jukebox at IMMA. One of the editors at The Four Faced Liar, she’s currently the recipient of a Dublin City Arts Bursary.
More work by Sinéad Griffin
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