One day a month, it became a kind of fortress
besieged by lads with haircuts and new ties
shifting between their cigarettes and briefs -
men of letter crawled on granite walls
wherein a flurry of vowels and balding wigs
is thick around the pillars and closed doors.
On other days, the silence is upheld:
no one breathes a word; new light is thrown,
noticed; a damp patch slurs;
the windows, in their cases, rattle on.

By Vona Groake