Cul-De-Sac

For days it was the B side to Veedon Fleece.
Unflipped it gathered dust. You blew it clean
then set the record spinning, needle-in-groove,
bewildered in the comfort of the thing.

I loved the jacket. The out-of-place-ness of it:
an awkward idyll, faux Edwardian
in its coloured-over black and white effect,
familiar and strange on even keel.

I’ve been there in that leaving, too. I’ve known
the sting of coming back across my hand,
walked concentric circles of lonely stone
and doubled back, not getting there from here.