at a birthday party
of a 30-year-old woman
who (teenaged) kissed
both of us once or another time.
the look of an opera singer,
beautiful as a valkyrie.
but this is not then. I’m pissing

upstairs, and before
I go in there these
two guys come out
and the pandemic’s gone on
for so long now I find it
quite novel that I don’t know
if they were in
to do coke or to fuck
and it doesn’t really matter
which either – both would be
somewhat cosmopolitan. I love it.
the urine’s release. and the window
with stars like the small flames
of tealights but no – that’s a tealight
after all, not a star. this is the city
and a cloud-covered night.

look, jack: I betrayed you
by kissing her then. I know
that you wanted it
and I didn’t want much and she
didn’t either – it was just
what happened.
even though now the three
of us are friends, and our lives

are like treeroots which grow
around rocks and break them
to gravel and corners.
late evening shadows
on the broken down ballymun
towers. gravel and corners as well.