AT THE OBLIVION TEA ROOMS by C.J. Allen

AT THE OBLIVION TEA ROOMS by C.J. Allen
Price: £8.99 ISBN: 978-0-9570984-3-5. pub. Nine Arches.


This is the first full-length collection that C.J. Allen has published since his 'New and Selected' from Leafe Press. Full of vintage Allen work, it comes highly recommended:


The Memory of Rain


The memory of rain on public parks
and tennis courts. The acres of regrets.
Sunset on the disused printing works,
as good as gold, as good as sunset gets.
The railings with their eczema of rust
you stood in front of once when you were nine
and watched the sky turn colourless and vast.
Dust like old grey blankets. Then more rain.


And love was once the very latest craze,
like alchohol, or sex, or Benzedrine,
and kicked in like all three. On quiet days
you'd watch the old men on the bowling green
and listen to their antiquated banter,
and go for walks, and feel a bit nonplussed,
and head for home and think about the winter
in rooms filled up with sunlight and with dust.