nostalgia

nostalgia

 

I know you’re here,

I can smell the patchouli

you wore at our first kiss,

and our kiss goodbye

 

are you playing hide ‘n’ seek?

 

remember the neighbours

thumping the walls

at our midnight parties -

Archie Shepp and Albert Ayler,

full blast

while we snorted coke

and smoked five-skinners?

 

cocaine, grass, jazz,

the odd fracas

then ‘kissing it better’

 

that’s how we rolled.

 

tripping together

in a Glastonbury bender,

that pyramid rising

in front of our eyes

 

angels danced around your head

trailing rainbow ribbons

 

you said my face changed

into a gargoyle

with a toxic spout

in place of a mouth

 

that kibbutz summer, our joint

tourist baptism at Bethabara

your white dress see-through

as you rose from the water

 

Jonny, our 'baptist’, had seen it all before -

his side-kick brought a camera

 

you, hippo-pregnant, nude,

washing off Dead Sea mud

in a warm spring at Ein Feshkha

 

you claimed flying home

would not harm our unborn…

                                                … stillborn son

 

(as the patchouli fades)

 

is there a god where you are?

 

the dent on the wall

when I ducked a cup you chucked

remains

 

the white stain where you tipped

hot tea over the table, missing me,

remains

 

and memories of your funeral

in an empty chapel.

 

 

 

 

It is often assumed that nostalgia is some gentle amble down memory lane however for many it is a mixture of days of farce and weeks of pain - this is what I wanted to get at here.