Document 1489
Like a Visitor
Author(s): Sheila Templeton
Copyright holder(s): Sheila Templeton
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You've left it
downie smoothed,
pillow sitting up
like a plump visitor.
I'm glad of this damp towel
crumpling a corner.
'Okay to have a bath,' you said.
Okay was you
sprawling careless limbs,
sloth draped
over the settee.
A cornflake mountain
drowned in milk.
Locust stripped fridge,
Dead Head Comics,
flicking T.V. channels,
driving me daft.
Not hearing
until I squatted down
into your eyeballs.
'What's that you're sayin' Mum ?'
I'm saying
That time you slammed
a fist into thin wall,
and you... wet newspaper,
chalky plaster mixed
in a jam jar,
tongue sticking out
in concentration,
covering the hole,
'Calm down Mother. It's FINE!'
Has left a space,
an empty place.
My hand finds it,
every time I climb
these stairs.
A bumpy, gritty patch,
unpainted and never
sanded smooth.
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APA Style:
Like a Visitor. 2024. In The Scottish Corpus of Texts & Speech. Glasgow: University of Glasgow. Retrieved 21 November 2024, from http://www.scottishcorpus.ac.uk/document/?documentid=1489.
MLA Style:
"Like a Visitor." The Scottish Corpus of Texts & Speech. Glasgow: University of Glasgow, 2024. Web. 21 November 2024. http://www.scottishcorpus.ac.uk/document/?documentid=1489.
Chicago Style
The Scottish Corpus of Texts & Speech, s.v., "Like a Visitor," accessed 21 November 2024, http://www.scottishcorpus.ac.uk/document/?documentid=1489.
If your style guide prefers a single bibliography entry for this resource, we recommend:
The Scottish Corpus of Texts & Speech. 2024. Glasgow: University of Glasgow. http://www.scottishcorpus.ac.uk.
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Like a Visitor
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