Wednesday, November 21, 2012

Personal Space

“I don't want to be a widow,”
you said.
The leaf that shivers
over the wire:

in her green interview,
no one told her
about the jump
in November.



And I, with my coffee precarious by my thigh, and a white upland morning contending with the lamp: about to turn to my Spanish, and to leave aside a poem that won't quite set. Death is turning up everywhere these days: he is one of those loud, intrusive strangers who uses your first name in your face and is too familiar with your wife. – Did you never hear, Mr Death, of personal space?

– No, hum a few bars and I'll fake it! – he grins, with a mouthful of teeth, and you realize you'd better leave well enough alone. Buffoon he may be, but he's not one to trifle with.

2 comments:

Zhoen said...

I've always found HIM a quiet, if disquieting, companion.

Dick said...

Short but very sweet, that poem.