As you took
old Mr Wheale
to the lavatory

and sat
and watched
he didn’t fall

or slide
you recalled
the night before

lying in Mrs Tuba’s bed
the curtains drawn
against the night

the street lamps
shining through
the bed soft and wide

and she turning up
the Mahler 5th
and you thinking

of the parish priest
and what he’d say
if he could have seen you

there smoking
naked and bare
the book you’d bought

on the side
the Solzhenitsyn
gulag book

she wanted to read
the dresser
and chest of drawers

and photos
on the side
nearly done

Mr Wheale said
breaking through
your thoughts

his cataract eyes
staring into space
and you remembered

Mrs Tuba coming in
the room
dressed in her pink

dressing gown
open down the middle
her ******* inviting

her big blues eyes
smiling
turned up

the Mahler
she said
bought these two whiskies

and she laid them
on the side
and climbed

into her bed
I’m done
Mr  Wheale said

and so you did
what was needed
and helped him dress

and on his way
his metal frame walker
shuffled along

the passageway
the music of Mahler‘s 5th
a memory

Mrs Tuba
gone to sleep now
you guessed

the whiskies drunk
the *** forgot
a new day entered

the window on your right
swift it had gone
that ****** night.