In autumn, I assume, the light has seeped between leaves and fallen
on the pagoda. The summerhouse with boarded up windows is full
of spiders, popped footballs, garden equipment. Here, like a dream
garbled, put through the filter of reason, I remember a line of fairy
lights wound round deadly nightshade, chitter-chatter of grown ups
in frilly neck-ties, in suits, or sipping wine. I was their invisible man;
I toddled off past the barbecue, up the path towards a granite statue
of Adonis. Looking back, my life was through a rose trellis.
It’s not what they promised. Conifers rise towards a skylight, weeds
a haven for creatures; a room where sills are piled with fly carcasses.
Patrick Wright has a poetry collection, Full Sight of Her (Eyewear), which was nominated for the John Pollard Prize. He has also been twice shortlisted for the Bridport Prize. His poems have appeared in Poetry Ireland Review, The North, Southword, Agenda, Wasafiri, London Magazine, and The Reader. He teaches English Literature and Creative Writing at the Open University.
More work by Patrick Wright
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