All Tomorrows

after the titanic sank I swam for six weeks against the ice-cold sea was battered at last against a rock, so here I squat now growing a beard of icicles in the storm that howls across the barren islet, and desperately labour to obliterate the three kinds of grief - for those who have drowned, for those who live, and for myself. while far behind me, washed up on the shoreline, all that I once loved is decaying now, waiting to be discarded for good:   my case with the music in it   my book with the words in it   my trunk with the recipes in it   my soul with all that I felt so I start anew now in the frozen wasteland for time is seemingly endless

last sunbeam last cigarette last eagle’s soar last kiss last steps last smile last breath last thought .

your clothes have no owner your books your cushion the you in me needs them still

you were the soil from which I drew you were the rain that kept me alive you were the sun that lit my leaves you were the cask in which I aged the soil is barren now it does not rain and the sun is black only the eagle remains

life erupts in a thousand colours yellow green perfume of lilac into the living glare of sunlight blessing our shortcomings — seen from behind my defensive carapace of black clothing relegated I am to the geriatric darkness of working through bereavement you do not see me here. you don’t even have eyes anymore I hope you don’t mind that I put down in words how wonderful life was while you were in the world

The waitress looks like David Gilmore. TV: 'George Clooney is in Sudan protesting against violence' Yeah right , the guy says at the next table. Breaking news, ay? 'Twelve children shot dead in Palestine'. So my kind of kind of news, innit? As if. When’s football on? Another bloke, late 50s, gelled hair, checkered shirt put on by wife: I was alone at home till half past three - missuz was at a corpse's viewing. Neat, innit? First bloke: Yeah right... I bet she was having fun somewhere else. Stage 4: ANGER

T -20      the chemo room            where your last treatment wasn’t completed T -19      the hospital            where you lay in the east wing T -6       the gloomy pit under the staircase           where we sat, and you smoked the last cigarette of your life T -4       the bed            where we left our last battleships unfinished                  you never saw my ships.  I saw yours after you died T +8hs    the meal room           where my world was shattered T +31    back in the sun           that is still black

hot breeze in pine tree by your grave a handful of freesias wilt on a lump of earth my cigarette wet with pain while fierce first spring sun peels away the skin from my skull when the axis spins: high above in the perfect blue the three eagles you loved cry Freedom and pierce my mind with joy I’m ready for nothing yet

when we were children again trembling in fearful amazement of each other, in the sun-specked shade of the Thinking Tree. your skin a book of silent pearls - trapped in a golden sphere of time

you are dead. death-blow in the solar plexus of this world. you are dead. the choir has stopped. ‘how is Inês, by the way…?’ she is dead. blew the world to shards. I tread the broken stone of this heart this life ‘I can’t live without you, now you will have to live without me’, with the shard of a soul. you saw it before you. you are dead. the chair where you sat, the smiles you smiled: still lifes now. naturezas mortas. today I ate the last meal that you made with your hands, six weeks ago. you were alive. now you are dead. I love you, and you’ll never love me back again so I’m tying up the loose ends now so no question shall remain so to ready my world for the silence to come. you are dead now: I must live without you for such a long time to come. your scent still fills the room. did you know it would hurt like this? you are dead. I live on in the unloving dark

from a hole the size of you I knit myself back into the distant light through a thousand loose ends into my very first new cycle: waiting to reboot