Paris, it could be, but for all you know,
London. A hotel room, four-poster, the sheets
clotted cream but for a Fool's Gold lining.
The en-suite, your bare feet
chilled.  A shampoo bottle left open, water blobs
that tiptoe across a grubby mirror. Then the blue eyes
discover yourself, wide and quite alive
but the morning has barely grown up. Teeth brushed,
face scrubbed, mobile on. Messages from all corners,
a yellow smile, a midnight memory
like an unearthed polaroid.  A trilogy of knocks.
The man, whose name you’d like to remember
for next time, brings twenty shades of breakfast.
The phone quivers again. A tanned brioche, little
butter rectangles too fiddly to exhume. You spot
a bruise on your arm, a wonky plum beneath
the surface where there wasn’t one before,
yesterday hits you now, strobe lights, a headache
that cracked as glass across your skull. Now this.
Bad breath, black coffee to blister the tongue.
And the message. Somebody wants you,
it seems, but you won’t want them back.