I remember seeing you
8 hours after my plane landed.
8 hours later,
My liver cursed me.
A bottle of whiskey.
I can't stand whiskey.
I couldn't come the next morning.
Hangover.
Cried myself to sleep
something pushed me out of bed
I had to be there that evening.
the vultures...
By your side
They were already planning your funeral,
Wait
Vultures is too noble term for them
At least vultures had the decency
to await their victim's death a few feet away.
I picked up your bible
In hopes reading it out loud
Would disperse the hovering birds
I started at psalms 23
Then 24
Some long forgotten lesson
Crept up
Unsummoned
it timidly knocked
I ignored it till the end of 25
Then it hit me
****!
Psalms 23... A dying man's last rites...
I kept reading with one hope
That I was wrong
I kept reading ,
And for first time in 10 years I prayed
To a God I believed
Had only our misery at heart
Then that deep breath from you
Almost a sigh
Then the silence
I called out to you
Once again a boy of 6
Wanting his father
mum took one look at me
told me to wait outside
The tone of voice
Last I heard when I was 8
A tone of voice
that demanded obedience
The nurse came in
I waited outside
Clutching his bible
I kept reading
Words that rang hollow
To a God who I thought could care less
The my mother came out
I knew before she told me
Telling my brothers was easy
I don't remember breaking down
Till I told my sister
I couldn't look her in the eye
Couldn't tell her
The man she expected
to walk her down the aisle
Was dead.
This was more or less what you left
A boy stuck in a man's body
A fatherless bride
A widow
And two young gentlemen
who you'd be proud of
So I sit now and write
Of that evening
When I read to you in your sleep
When I read as I once did
When I was a child.
You always said you loved
the sound of my voice.
that evening in February
When I reached the end
Of psalms 27
And you reached the end
Of your life