The hall is pleasantly packed and hums
with whispered voices like a weekday wine bar
or an autumnal garden near the village road.
The space echoes handsomely.
The compere stands outside, a robin
singing warm welcome, his wings wider
than the open doors. He shuffles from foot to foot,
checks his watch, nibbles a fingernail.
Across the room is a face I see and recall. Remember?
We talked on a commuters’ train to Crewe, before you
interviewed me for a place on a teaching course there.
Then shared the trainride back home, a decade ago.
The poets arrive, bless the congregation
with a shared prayer and then sit. The raised stage
quickly becomes a kitchen conversation and invisible smokes
of cigarette coax concealed wine glasses,
chandeliers soften to down lights,
coughs become the dog yawning and both men forget the crowd
that listens like an eavesdropper to their secrets,
complicit. Each hopes the other won’t reveal them.