The Book of Lost Addresses 7

The house in Miskin Street


This is a journey
I could make with you,
to say farewell to walls
that gave precarious refuge
when you were small.

There were three of us at first,
then there were only two.
Of all our temporary homes,
this is the last to fall:
the bay window still screened
in lace, the distant, glitzy
city view, the annexe
rented by a post-war migrant
from Bohemia, a bachelor
bus driver, who one night
in a drinking bout slashed
his belongings into slivers
with an antique sword.

Mrs McSweeney and her son,
both seldom sober, lived next door
across the hall. We weren't
there long, and now the house
has been restored.
It's changing hands once more,
but there's no vestige of out tenancy.
Wild jasmine fragrance in the garden
overpowers me. This was the place
where I read 'Quiet Don',
and you first learned to walk.


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This poem first appeared in
the literary journal 'Antipodes',
Volume 20, No. 2, December 2006.