rose cleaning

filthy bike chains have been strung around

rosebushes in the garden of the old Frenchman next door

who hangs his clothes to dry on the low front fence

thumbs gently at the air as though it were a woman’s face

as though it were a bead of longing on a woman’s face –

leaves the grass unmown around a fresco table

strewn with books, some warped, some funked by the marshalling clouds –

with desperate care you tend to every flower

degrease using the cuff of the old jacket you have on

the smell a compound of WD40 and animals

petals the colour of your eyelids when you shut them to trespass

the colour of the scarf your mother wore but never left the house in

green twigs underfoot leaking white liquid –

then you realise the pressure of oafish fingers over hours

will only wreck the roses, who can't object or even cower –

and in a cataract-like puddle, you string the chain around

your right hand, quivering for no good reason

present the accursed offering to the dreadlocked men in the shed

of the local bike share – its uselessness belied

by the bead of the end of the good in the world on your face

that's thumbed off by their gentle thanks and the Biblical shower.