THE CROISSANT

The croissant innocent there upon its circle of white porcelain
is the sculptress I lived with on Colney Hatch Lane the girl
with a smile who operated the follow-spot. The Lane led
notoriously to a madhouse but I stayed south with my bicycle
dripping light oil on the knotted cord carpeting just inside
her front door an English racer with taped handlebars
tamed and accounted for like Picasso’s head of a bull
an escaped simile in this short chant dedicated to the metaphors
of my time in Sam Wanamaker’s tent theatre on the Bankside
the Bull’s Head a fantasy pub where I met Chaucer’s ghost
as he pushed his ethereal head into the table distraught
with his next tale the tent theatre my nomadic life in London
Archway to Greenwich to Clapham to West Hampstead
to the aforesaid Colney Hatch Lane not to mention
all the other rectangles of linoleum cold to the touch
in Notting Hill Gate for example where the carnival
taught me how to dance to Reggae between pub tables
my formative years a place for elbows and wet pints
of Guinness their circular kisses overlapping
in Venn diagram fashion room for breathing
getting smaller and smaller the linoleum
the backdrop the ever present back cloth
where all my dreams came to life at night
and returned to their flat world by day