Night is limitless
sleep stutters moon flutters
through shifty cloud :
& dawn rises heavy with the cry of birds
flocks of gulls, harsh raucous
unforgiving.

Sleep drains through
handkerchief of memories
jumbled maybes: I ask you
how you’ve been, but only
silence answers.

Old worries surface
these restless nights
things I should have done
places we used to meet lie
abandoned.

Yes we’re changed,
hung from branches of memory tree:
you lie alone, as you must have been
while I lived my life young and free
only now I truly feel;
the salt tart madness of your tears

as you waited for me.