In Memoriam Camerone



Red skirt below black blouse she passes
With her smile

Contact Hospital Urgent
Daughter Seriously Ill
Recalling memories from a warm Spring
Night
When once I loved:
What is this within my hand?
Regret Inform You
Daughter Died Today.


File as Form P158
As drains my office day
Toward death

"Five Duty lapsed"
Spreading no rumours
Of doom.
 

What has one left
Save the urgent ululations
Of dreams that once
On a hot summer's day
In a country far distant
Sent a youth rushing into arms
Where innocence was taken
Like this woman - whose black blouse
Hides beautiful breasts -
Takes these forms that are only forms
Bereft of life.

What has one but the ways
That once were learned
When I learnt how bullets
Turned a body and how some women
Bore within their clothes burning
Hearts

"Calculator, please"
What have I left save the passing passion
Moment that soon will pass toward a future
Full of regrets unlike that day now distant
When Spring leapt into my life
Stirring tears in a man too full to dream
Amid a city sun and body sweat
That held no promise but my own.

What have I left
Save the silent spinnings of Destiny
Gold beneath gods
That once others followed
In a country far distant
As Degueldre bled tears before Jeanpierre
While a world scorned all rumours of doom.
 

But, returning, my lover smiles
And sighs, softly:
"Where shall we go tonight?"
While red below black, beads bounce
Upon her breasts
And her shapely shadow touches mine
Recalling dreams from our damp
Dependable night.

What is this now within my hand?

Regret to inform you, I resign
For I'm the damned
Bound for another land
 
 
 
 

DW Myatt

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