You are the last of them

You are the last of them
they have fallen like
tin ducks in a shooting gallery
but you endure
in your tiny flat
your confessional
walls banked by display cabinets
their doors bulging to contain
a slurry of opaque memories

The anecdotes you do not tell define you

Time has you in its spiteful maw and it shakes you like a rag doll
but you are stubborn
you defy it
perhaps it does not have the stomach for your tiny brittle bones

We put you in your chariot
and swathed you and swaddled you in the rug my sister bought
and we walked the streets of Harrow
streets you had not seen in years
had not wanted to see again

Eventually we were ready
and when we sat together to eat
I could see at once that you were frozen to the bone
but did not have the strength to tell me

I went to you and I held you in my arms and gave you my heat
would have given you my blood
I did not realize
how could I have betrayed you to the cold?

But you had always expected me to