 |
Poem taken from:
home more or less by Paul Casey
Poem of the Week
Monday, June 04, 2012
AFRICAN GREY by Paul Casey
for Nicole-Marie
There you are little sister
an Irish mist about your cheek
and I here at your headstone
a libation of Irish Mist
the long-stained glass of goodbye
the sip for your twenty-fifth
These afterlives that lull
in their African afternoons
listen past each hard edge
of our breath
hold up their sharp light
as we crumble in the rain
Butterflies forgotten in the sun
follow imaginations that hold them
imprint themselves in kaleidoscopic visions
that race the wind
where a day is a lifetime
a lifetime one vivid day
Spirit-bright eyes conjure tears
as much for not having words
as for joy, for loss wound
from the forge and fire,
flame-sweet salt poured out of season
a northern wind, a sparrow that turns the day
The physical things of this place, my sister,
what we witness here
and must love,
spiral in thermals
on the wings of an African Grey
an eye of pearl, an eye of onyx
Your whispers in the dark
I’ll mimic for the loss of you
a sip for your brothers now
a sip of mist for your mother
a sip for your father
and one for yourself again
A spider is weaving there
or waiting
the wind is busy
or still
it all waits without you
does not wait
Copyright © Paul Casey 2012
