memory

Sketched Memory

I reminisce in watercolours running
as if fresh upon a new page stained
in a sketchbook I had once discarded
on a parkbench left out in the rain

those memories I painted with such nuance
now with each raindrop lose some line or form
like the years passed by as scattered pages
from forgotten sketchbooks roughly torn.

Thermopylae

we sang our songs under this hill
and drank until the sun had died
it was to us as sacred soil
our youthful dreams in its ground lie

we kissed our first under this hill
and battled inexperience
loved in the shadows of its mill
unfettered by impermanence

to this day when thoughts retreat
and regrets cloud them with their sighs
to spring shadows now defeated
by time’s hand, at our Thermopylae.

The Rose Sleeps

lo! the rose sleeps in her grave
sheltered by no stone
no resurrection for her save
when winter’s gales are blown

for the summer’s warmest showers
have dried to death’s cold hand
and the harvest’s gifted hours
are stolen from this land

so the rose lies in her grave
blackened foul decay
no raptured resurrection save
the memories she plays.

The Mirror Man (rewrit)

I thought on an old mirror
sporting Henry Winkler’s face
and the legend read
“da Fonz is cool”
for years it’s been misplaced
I wonder what it’s doing now
that Henry Winkler’s old
perhaps it’s in an attic
still young and cool and bold.
As a mirror it really had no use
this painted looking glass
which is likely my hair was such a mess
in that dim and distant past
but like the Fonz, that part of me
is gone and far away
a turned up denim memory
of some old Happy Days.