When
the city of London exploded,
I cried alone for days.
Was that it?
Crying for a man overseas
who hung painting
from a  west indie tree?
Some Imperial freedom
from which we develop.
The city explodes
and buzzes
for days afterwards.
I think of every word
in the mouth
of every woman
in every building in town.
Dracula
comes to the Metropolitan centre
and we gossip
about men
who write like Bysshe Shelley
and love like Mary.
They have angels
about their homes,
I have heard soliloquised,
and knaves in the room.
I sob,
I am like them, too.
The primadonna
baby pink fin de siècle
will not free me.
Where
affection is a
concept of avant garde
and of
the outer versus inner
comes absolutely nothing
but
a dissolution
of scientific certainty.

O mother dear of this my life
you were more to me like a wife
as we lived together for a while
after dad had died and in style.

We went just about everywhere together
though it depended much on the weather.
And the fact that I was more reclusive
meant that it was hard to be inclusive.

Ours was a supremely chaste interdependence
which worked well to the point of transcendance.
Although I was the son and you were the mother
I would often give advice like a husband and father.

You had various problems with your health
but this did not undermine spiritual wealth.
There were certain things that you would more or less ignore
due to a stubborn habitual independence that I would implore.

I tried to enhance your life and give you much more
rather than take anything away out of nature’s store.
And when that was stiffled with outside interference
the end result being one of a regretful ill occurence.

You lived to the ripe old age of eighty eight
and in all you did you were never really late.
You would try to help one and all in your own way
and people would look up to you and kind words say.

A very resourceful lady and one with a certain skill
you tried your hand at many things and the time fill.
I would often marvel as to how you got everything done
with a single minded purposefulness you ignored none.

Now gone is the lady of the house
who played the part of a spouse
and all that we used or shared together
is now idle at the mercy of the weather.

But her love still guides me in my heart
and urges me on daily to play the part
in doing the things that she would like me to do
even though she’s gone by doing to remain true.
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