Day: April 19, 2016

elegy, twenty years on

box steps, they hedged us in four/four
she led, I stumbled ‘cross the floor
more awkward dancers since unseen
one tall, one short and plump, one lean.

The ballad – Beatles – sung in French
Was only Muzak. Now a wrench
Goes through me at that tenor croon.
Ma belle, she danced us to the tune

Of innocence, of girlish ploys,
Of drama, gossip, clothes, and boys
And with her loss, my childhood ends.
She suffered. I cannot pretend.

There is a truth that nothing mends:
My government has killed my friend –
Though years have passed the thought refrains,
– and I will not trust them again.

…
…

An elegy, the poets say
Is meant, in words, to show the way
A person grieves, the stages met —

It seems I’m not quite finished yet.

T.S. Davis, ©2013

Obviously not an acrostic, but something I wrote a few years ago about a dear childhood friend who was killed in Waco, Texas. Some places in life are places where you simply… stop. Here’s where the story ends…