Façades
Look, just look, at the façades of houses,
Grey, brown, weatherbeaten, argus eyed,
Less tall than silent, distinguished than old,
Commanding the street, remanded by an eye.
Like implications rigorous stairs wind,
Decline, incline, some even plainly lead
To privacy: a cut glass chandelier
Hives, perhaps too dignifiedly, reservations,
Or a naked bulb irradiates fear
Of masked tensions to a gas jet unfed.
Habitations also need men
Exhaling their absence as underground
Rivers in ancient time were thought mouths of hell.
Into them too an Orpheus absorbed in love
Of some past phase can as freely disappear.
The door locks behind him and his rare
