Tonight
   got away from the mess
city   toothache     throb
ensemble of car horns
     shoppers throwing     money
like empty   sweet wrappers

park is better
calming me     a cup of cocoa
stepped     into Narnia
     without the wardrobe

snow   squeals   with each step
little deaths
   little graves where others have   stood
a ring of prints from   a hundred   shoes

breathe in     white silence
   find frost’s left a hypothermic   dance
between wires   of a tree
   white fibres together as arms

sweep clean   the bench
   blanket of sherbet
sit and think
how simple it is to be     forgotten
   alone   a caterpillar of tinsel
in a tattered   brown box
not allowed to   shine past
   December thirty-first

or not shine at all
   rather a rope of dud   fairy-lights
   I wonder   I wonder
lamppost emits a   frigid glow
night unfurls above my head
  
   I left my gloves
at home     again