~for Clare
Here in this house, in which you are absent,
I wish I could say what it’s like to be here,
drinking tea in a blue-patterned mug
while the rain mutters and spatters
the flagstones. All day long, the wind
has been howling, trying to sneak
through a crevice or crack.
What’s it like where you are now,
far beyond the land of the living?
Our world is so much less with your absence,
like the smudge that the moon makes
as it brushes the sky. It feels as if you’re
nearby, just out of sight, a floater, a speck,
at the far edge of consciousness. The veil’s
pulled thin here in Ireland, a translucence
that might be crossed if only I knew
the right words, the patterns, how to read
the leaves, how to climb the ladder of stars.
Beautiful!