He has gone.
A mere shadow of his former self.
But I still see him in the passing faces,
or queuing for the bus,
or shopping In the supermarket.

I see him
not as I saw him last
in his bed:
his penultimate resting place,
but as he was throughout those
years.

A child,
a playmate,
an adolescent evacuee,
a youthful, excited participant
in all those artistic delights.
The nudes, the landscapes,
the biblical, familial and  historical
inspirations.

And during those
Italian years.
Honing his artistic style.
Enjoying, and being enjoyed by,
that colourful scene
as eccentric as he himself
was destined to become.

And now he is no more.

And I am suddenly
and painfully
struck by this terrible thought:
he was the oldest surviving relative
of that generation,
the offspring of
a mother who was
the sister of my father.

It is a mantle I have had ****** on me.
I am the patriarch.