you were there, smiling,
greeting me with a handshake, a half hug

your band was preparing to play
for a wedding, a celebration within a celebration

the chair was never there, the one
you kicked from under your feet, forty years past

I wish...but we know it was,
and we know a young bride found you hanging

suspended in a time we called simpler
though it wasn't--suffering still our common denominator

but last night, in my slanderous slumber  
I defied the fates, brought you back to life

one where the chair, the cord were never
there, and you didn't take this life's longest leap

the thirty three inches through a silent
air, where you landed with muted screams

only to return in dreams, to say you were
doing well, without the woe of all these years

the rest of us were left to endure