ECHOLOCATION

for SM

This was our way of keeping in touch.
Touching base with the time.
The time I had woken before sunrise.
Sunrise today is at 07.33.
At 07.33 you were frying eggs.
Eggs were eaten at 08.10.
08.10 in two separate counties.
Counties that yawned the country open.
Open the curtains, 08.22.
08.22, clocking off.
Off into the day like a train.
Trains of thought that spirograph back.
Back out and back into the dusk.
Dusk, 16.14, and a prayer to home.
Home, where it is just gone sunset.
Sunset today is 16.36.
16.36 and I go outside and watch bats.
Bats echolocate here and in Yorkshire.
In Yorkshire are you hearing this?

SOMETHING AND NOTHING

Life is stepping down a step or sitting on a chair — and it isn't there.
— Ogden Nash

This morning I thought you were dead
until I saw your chest heave
underneath a heavy breath
that lifted the sheet then dropped it.

It's something and nothing. Either
could have passed, berthed side by side
like boats. Either, perhaps both,
of us could have gone in a gasp.

Is this getting old? When you woke
I decided not to spook
you with an open casket
that, after all, was never there.

But it nagged me, lingered. Worn ghosts
that walked out of the woodwork.
Fear, from knowing everything
is dissipating like a breath.