"… I looked at the bed and thought "Oh my God, I could have died in there," and that's how I would have been found. And then from one second looking horrible it suddenly transformed itself into something removed from me, … something beautiful." -Tracey Emin, talking about the inspiration for the artwork 'My Bed.'

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from inside my bed the world looks different

far away and dismissed like a bad dream

to the kitchen is a lethal trek for water

but upon returning, with that hungover clarity

i see it not like some sort of tent or tunnel

that you could truly be inside at all, but just

some boards on legs comforted by assorted fabric-

the Tweenies pattern isn't post-ironic, it was just here

inside that cupboard when we moved into the flat-

surrounded by the precious jewels and junk that stick to people

as they move their way along throughout their lives:

my wine- stained bedside cabinet's overflowing

with makeshift ashtrays full of Polish cigarettes,

single earrings, contact lenses, and Elliott Smith cassettes

that i recorded, going retro, last year when my walkman died

the green plastic monster truck we found out past Portobello

dirt encrusted in the shadow of a burnt out caravan wreck

and one single flower in an empty whisky bottle-

i'm not the sort of girl who always keeps a vase in case-

and on the floor beside it, on the carpet that was new,

clean, "biscuit beige in mint condition" when we got here

are piles of paperback books which altogether add up

to an education or just a fine i can't afford upon returning

Joyce, Dunbar et al to their rightful homes on library shelves

then there's last night's clothes and condoms, i slept naked-

and, from about half- past five, alone – a broken sparkly eye mask

Xtra-strength painkillers, and a children's jewellery kit

with letters which i use to wear my heart upon my sleeve

yawning, i dismiss objective vision, crawling back inside

the hollow for my body, smelling of me and someone else.