BROKEN ABRACADABRA

My uncle shimmers
as he walks

as if the sun has got him
and shakes him

until he walks
like waves.

His gait all
heat haze.

He's a walking
reflection

as if the air
were water.

He looks like
he's a dream

made of summer

but he is the real thing
a solid Uncle Michael.

I expect his voice
to waver with the heat

but his words
stay steady

whittled out of love
like wood.

I am up a tree.

He can't see me.

The branch below me has sn-
-apped

and I am wondering like a cat
how in hell I am

going to get down.

Up here in the air
the farm is the map

of itself.

I share a branch with a bird
and a small cloud.

Uncle goes on looking for me
his voice searching the everywhere

but I am a nowhere.

His voice trying to pull me
out of thin air

like a magician would
but it's not good.

I am half sky half tree half child
...do the maths.

I feel like a white rabbit
lost inside a top hat.

He died one sunny Sunday
******* a sweet in the blue van.

I still see him
walking out of the sun

his body shivering
with the heat

as if he is a dream
calling my name

like an abracadabra.

I sit in the silence
in the middle of my sky

lost in that forever
summer

wondering how to get back
down on solid ground

calling his name
like a broken magic spell

always trying to find him
even though I can't

...find my self.