for Chrissy Banks & i.m.Tony Charles
As I remember
and your dual texts always
and ever will
confirm
there we were
sitting writing in black
somehow poetic osmosis I guess
we’d all agreed
beforehand
to dress as for a funeral w/rite
but then in a group of friends
someone has to go
first
amongst prosaic notes I jotted
the rimming of reflection
your and your
shadowed eyes
scratched out from
these garish hideous
exotic flowers
left in
waiting to be
stitched
or embroidered tightly
into a final wreath
Now nearly twenty years
later looking for
something else other
past drafts
finding these
lines
how they pop-up
from the abandoned book
I understand why I was reluctant to share
I look at words you can not see
It is as then
I didn’t couldn’t know
the reason for this rite
though as I said
someone had to go
first others
left to bear the fruit
couldn’t know
we share a barrel of biscuits bottle of wine
still together the three of us
music breathing the clock
I closed the book
blacked its message
until now
when this poem heaves itself
from the sheaf of neglected notes
replete with a foretaste of grief
yet new the baby thrusts out its fist