The Garden Sleeper
He slept for years out of doors
in a garden in London, his daytime
job, some sort of writer.
I didn't know him, but my path
as a young typist must have crossed his:
not only a bright colleger
but an abandoned lover, a philosopher,
a gardener without a garden
and a loafer in cafes rode to work with me.
From my north London window also
came the peck of a typewriter,
above the tired lemon shrub trees
hemmed in by dozing cats.
Trapped among statuary
lay summer-houses all year through.
He slept behind
the throng, the push of humankind,
the escalator pit,
the tall deaf buildings
connecting squares,
mind burrowing
in sentence-stretches, bits of maps
out of the libraries, museums,
much-loved bookshops.
Leaves opened out
in a city of milllions.
We read each other now.
A scrap in a plant-pot in my room
turned into a fuchsia.
Daisy-light shone by the railings.
At last, we all saw our
fought-for survivals
unfold. Each road led to another.
We do not live in London
and I have a garden
I am too old to sleep in.
1990
poem by Sally Evans
Added by Poetry Lover
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