~and for Harlan, who loved this one best~
"for tandem is the ever-changing, graying color of their fierce attached tenacity"
waking/walking in
careful pacing regular lock steps,
like new cadets, counting cadence,
in perfect silent, almost motionless,
except for the minuscule quivering of
slightly parted moving lips
these two elders,
still now plebes,
freshmen
but of a latter, graduated stage,
demonstrating robustly
the slow shuffle-along,
a well practiced dance conjured
'in tandem'
her arm, crooked in his,
his other hand,
in protective custody of a
knight's armored chain glove
encasing hers,
he, shuffling just,
a precise, intended half-a-beat slower
lest she ever think
that she, ever be a drag upon him
hair, his,
threaded with daily,
new arriving grays,
proudly accepted
as the privilege of
graceful aging
hers,
disguised with periodic outings,
outings for the hidings of life's bookmarks,
conceding nothing ever to
time's lunatic desire to separate them
modest in dress,
styling hints of pasts' elegant,
the man's hat defiant,
daringly jaunty angled,
a small scarf to handbag knotted,
matching his Windsor knotted tie
the passers-by, all smile,
the signal charm of an
end game processional,
thinking so sweet,
yet mine eyes detect more,
something
hardy and radical
a fierce, fierce fierceness,
both fighters in the resistance,
armed with tandem tenacity,
ground given,
but only inches surrendered,
wounds resisted by
scar skin toughened
by the caress of ions bonding
under the pressure
of atomic level mutuality
worn out,
well past Purple Hearts,
no capitulation feared,
to the ever changing,
enemies' new disguises,
they,
a two person platoon,
each,
having the other's back
and I burst into tears on the street,
a train of out loud moans,
even groans emitted,
like a string of perfect pearls
breaking,
clattering on an asphalt terrain
weeping
not
from visions of the inevitable,
sighing
not
from the certitude of a
cycle's uptime ending
but jealous furious by this reminder delightful,
angry at myself, for having lost so many wasted years,
mine, the loss greatest, for absent was the
fierce tenacity of tandem
for my aussie prof:
you will know me well
by the color of
my happy brimming tears
