The Stray

The park is a blue whale
harpooned by winter.

No-one comes. The gates
are locked, swollen with ice.

Dogs hold court
around the litter bins:

they sniff each other's arseholes
and piss on the swings.

The air is so thick with dogbreath
you could cut it with a fish slice.

Hanging around the toilets,
near the bandstand,

the dog-faced man waits
and watches silently.

He wears a pith helmet, khaki shorts
and army surplus boots.

He looks like a bombardier
or an Egyptologist

and writes what he sees
into a small black book.

Sometimes he tears out odd pages
and pins them to the snow.

This is a tree. This is a rose bush.
This is dog shit. This is fog.

When spring comes
the dogs melt, gates unlock;

the dog-faced man lies down
in a hieroglyph of blood.

The town feels whole again.

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