When the swallows have run, the sky is darker, tender in the chugging glow of clouds under sodium. Our embers tinge the hug of night, tinge the fat drops of autumn rain, tinge the grunt of buses, and the queues of names waiting to find a home. The doorways from the bus shelters, the corner offices, the trains, are dripping with acceptance, with anxious contentments, with weary stresses carried in holdalls and briefcases, laptops and purses. There is a street; a figure scurries in slow motion; there is a flicker before a window, the window of a terrace. A celestial angel sits faceless inside, white glowed by a television. I am on the street; I look in; you are home.

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