18 JUNE 1994, Page 34

The End of the Terrace

She sees soldiers in her attic, Papers melt on her stair, A child stops in her hallway `I don't want to go in there.' I wait in the warm basement Thick coffee on the spoon I watch her husband's shoulders Brood across the room.

I cross her steps at midnight Beneath the open moon. The dead lie safe as houses. The living rise at noon.

Alison Brackenbury