I hadn’t known what it was
To wake ‘with a start’
Til that frost-bitten morning
When the tiler came.
His ladder clattered
Against the wall
With such a hearty clunk
That any dream I may have
Been dreaming was torn
Open, and light poured in.
His body, bug-eyed
By the wintry glass
Between us,
Lurched up the rungs
Like a sleepwalker,
Hammer nodding on his hip,
The scrape of tiles
Dragging me from my bed
To sit at the desk
And stare at the ice
On his boots, of which
There is so much to say.