Departure detail

Her arm curving across the bed to his back,

his name like a strike.

The horse shaped piece of woodchip wallpaper, in canter,

her dirty knickers, gusset up in the fireplace grate,

the pickled eye of the bare light bulb,

her skin, as blotched as processed meat.

A single baked bean on the spine of 'Heart of Darkness'

a pair of pinking shears shoved in next to the potatoes.

His key, briefly a shoreline across her palm.