I found a gift-tag tailed with silver string
dropped by our bed, ironically heart-shaped,
gold cardboard, unattached to anything,
attracting bits of fluff and Sellotape
and, placed between your hairbrush and your pills
with ribbon from the final gift you wrapped,
reflected in a mirror that revealed
With all my loveblue-biro’d on the back.
Your present, a belated jeu d’esprit,
this black and orange clip-on kipper tie,
its flourish of your old tomfoolery
intended to, with love, mock-horrify,
turned up too late to carry off the joke
but left me grateful, knowing how you’d tried,
still hearing laughter, stifled as I woke,
and truly, by the morning, horrified.
