Parkdale, then Princess Street

Make them say yes before you even ask,

L’essence de charme, c’est ça. The mind’s a damsel

Locked in a tower with her fathom of   hair.

Coax the braid and it’ll all be over.

The rooms are plain where I am interviewed,

Abstract and clinical, and so I glory

Like a corpse plant, perfume the marble-faced

With the reek and prodigy of my tomorrows.

Dying is so boring as the soul

Rummages the liquidation sale

For a final bargain —

But time outbids all comers, and we die

Expensively in Princess Margaret

Who was herself once so beautiful.