With open arms, unripened June
reaches skyward where criss-cross runes,
like cloudy kisses, vaporise.
Approaching our meridian
on wheels, I duck its overhang,
gaze through windows and hurry past;
untaken timelines, glimpsed and gone
in the passage between stations.
Deep sat, my crows feet eyes backtrack,
echo distant, tunnel vision.
In its shoebox a photo fades -
lover’s keepsake of gilded years -
and there before you first fetched breath,
all mock demure, your mother smiles.
Youth supposes endless encores.
But leant on wall, hands tucked behind,
the image speaks of no return:
leaves me to plumb that pool of genes
for common features, weaving stitches
out of scars. The hidden birthmark
ageing, losing definition.
Decades later, from time to time,
the disjoined stories rendezvous,
make cameo appearances
along the riverbank. I'm perched
in blustery spitter spatter
on a barstool with espresso:
scanning the walkways' lit parade
to fit, in teatime’s suck tide, each
quick step in its place. Yet skirting
sentiment until - as five chimes -
out of the grey you stride, across
the bridge between us, into view
all heels and legs and brimful
of confidence. Neck like a pillar;
bold as once I was, decades since.
Then marching off to the nearest,
noisiest pub, we talk full tilt
and reason you've reached half my span.
So from here on our ratio narrows:
as day dims slowly might-have-beens
get overthrown, while shared things grow.
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