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F i nal Cut Walter’s, Oxford Four days to leaving, he has his hair done, lets her cradle his head, turn it from side to side. Behind each ear the slow blade moves, removes strands that have taken root of their own accord: tenacious, out of sight, secure in knowledge of their chosen plot. The pressure is just right. So for a while, feet angled over the floor, he travels all alone in that uncertain room framed by the chair, lights. Finding the mirror too close, he closes his eyes, approximates the thirteen-hour night between to and from, sun warming the earth enough in sleep to set him on his way. Among the things he’ll never fathom, this conspiracy of air – how a cold morning, or unexpected rain (so often making one city feel like another) might, given perfect conditions, transform into a river high above the rough surface of this sea-level, waiting to lift or leave us. On cue, a draught enters the shop, sends his cut ends into heavy drifts, banks. No-one watches, but he wonders if it is like a dance. Which are coming, which the leaving ones. 92
page 97
Moving House These are things that shake us in our sleep: doors left open, drawers, the bare-backed chair that still, without a coat, swivels gently, books in boxes. Pictures taken down, squares of darker paint turned over to the sun, and above all, their wiring undone, the lights’ glass tubes put away in plastic. Once is enough. The eye learns to plot all of this in each new habitation, recognize the empty room’s joints, pivots, dimensions – every house has a skeleton – while the body learns it must carry less from place to place, a kind of tidiness that builds, hardens. Some call it fear, of change, or losing what we cannot keep. Others, experience. Truth is, it has no name or station, and only the weight we give. Old friend, I feel its steep tug again this evening, across wire and lens as you show me the house, a bare continent. (These are things that shake us in our sleep.) 93

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F i nal Cut

Walter’s, Oxford

Four days to leaving, he has his hair done, lets her cradle his head, turn it from side to side. Behind each ear the slow blade moves, removes strands that have taken root of their own accord: tenacious, out of sight, secure in knowledge of their chosen plot. The pressure is just right. So for a while, feet angled over the floor, he travels all alone in that uncertain room framed by the chair, lights. Finding the mirror too close, he closes his eyes, approximates the thirteen-hour night between to and from, sun warming the earth enough in sleep to set him on his way. Among the things he’ll never fathom, this conspiracy of air – how a cold morning, or unexpected rain (so often making one city feel like another) might, given perfect conditions, transform into a river high above the rough surface of this sea-level, waiting to lift or leave us. On cue, a draught enters the shop, sends his cut ends into heavy drifts, banks. No-one watches, but he wonders if it is like a dance. Which are coming, which the leaving ones.

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