One Saturday Night, Just Thinking
I was out of the country, twenty-three years ago, when they took you from the wreckage. I was out of the country when they placed you in the coffin.
You were eighteen that last time I saw you, wearing that shirt you loved, the one you stole from Martin. It looked suddenly too big for you, and your face was cold and swollen and our kisses couldn’t wake you.
I still have that photo ID of you that you had done when you were fifteen for the school holiday to Italy. Oh Gerard, my young brother, you look so handsome. I kiss that photo often. I kiss it now. But the kisses can never wake you.
How useless time is, when it’s all spent.
on the table an hour
a central star widens
in the sliced lemon