Slip

The details slip, how blue the sky, how white

the foam, how high the waves rode in the sea,

rough or tranquil – and its exact degree.

The sharpness of the moment and its insight.

The image slips, whole edges blur with age,

some colours rub off, some fade’s added in,

things once intense and profound slowly thin,

covers wear, silverfish damage the page.

The hours slip, while I panic and clutch

at that elusive word, picturesque phrase

must nail it down, stick it in, or the haze

will take it all beyond reach, beyond touch.

And yet it slips, fast and slow, part by part

nothing is safe in the brain or the heart.

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Frangipani

Each velvet-soft frangipani memory

falls on a bank then washes away

with the tides into the light of the sea

hovering between a darkness and a day.

An old woman, with gnarled tree fingers

stoops to pick a handful for her apron

but waves flash one burst of gold and silver

snatch them in and then forever darken.

A sparrow pecks at mud for unseen insects

and calls the flock and cocks its head and waits

and rushing wings do come out and connect

but all the same find nothing, it’s too late.

The last ferry, with a blast on its horn, pulls

through silk-dark rivers, frangipani petals.

In Memoriam

I know when I open the door

the rooms will be empty, and dusty.

Their dust has long been scattered, washed

from the river into the sea;

there’s just the photo on the wall.

I know that I must turn the key,

yet I stop and raise my hand to knock

as though someone still waits for me.

The streetlamp in front sputters and glows

unsteady in some Morse like code.

A car’s long hand on the horn

skims down from the end of road,

the silence inside screams once, and twice

and then goes into rustling mode.

I turn the knob, the portrait is there

just that it's a bit more yellowed.

The light’s a whisper of the dark -

the frizz of smoke blown from its lips.

Silk thin shadows their edges blurred,

a sunmoonstar in reversed eclipse;

the dust a plume of a lonely search

paused before some rambling scripts

and death’s life with its grim mouth pursed

drumming the silence with fingertips.