John-Ward Leighton

NINETEEN YEARS

since we saw each other
nineteen years to be different people
all that was old is becoming something new
the world has rotated many times
and time has sandpapered our souls and faces
and the memory of all those other times and places

somewhere in the detritus of memory
and the spaces in the music
all of it stuck in the time it was first heard
and his fingers didn’t need spell checking
and he didn’t hear his heart beating in his pillow

I finally read the travel document and know
of a time in the future when I will see her face
and the face of the Queen of my Heart
only a child now
what will she remember
when all this is past

I contemplate the rapidly receding landscape
toward my own end
and know there are places and people I’ll never see again
my internal sound track is filled with other people’s poems
and songs that never seem to end

there is a relentless beat travelling around the bend
each heart beat closer to the end
and I know my time is short
this will be our last time
to put right the events of the past
if in fact you can ever change the past
and end the monster silence of
nineteen years