Cheap jokes flap back from him: happy meal happy. It tastes like the flavourless asparagus of petal-less stalks. Out of the window I catch a glimpse of the scaffolding of stalks that is the winter rose garden Out of his unshaven nocturnal face, hairs prick out like the slithering wisps of blue on forgotten bread. Out of hidey-hole pores mangy black hairs advance. The dark roots of a mangrove tree hissing to drain me to a mangy darkness Hissing excitedly like mirrorless gorgons, right under his kind nose. He just wants to have fun. But they want something different. Shrivel my skin to a slash of senile white cellophane, drifting in the reeking December wind.
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