That was Philip's Room

For you, it was always the lonely interior
At nine o’clock the curtains would be drawn
On the starched damask and flock wallpaper
 
Note the imprisoned begonias, the neat lawn
A study in brown, some Highland scene –
Antlers and crepuscular melancholy
 
Everything here is cream or mushroom brown
Nature is subdued by suburban irony
Such houses have been lost to history
 
Old sheet music curls on the piano stand
If only the wild notes of some New Orleans band
Could impose upon this Victorian gentility
 
Through an open doorway I can picture you:
The tea-rings, the ash-burned coverlet
The stacked discs, your well-thumbed library
 
That was Philip’s room. I can imagine
Your history – faded and nicotine yellow
The faded porn, Palgrave’s Golden Treasury