What Truly Lies Buried in the Past

Once again, it’s you and I

In the convertible at the drive-in

I’ve got the transistor radio

Balanced on one shoulder

Precariously dialed into the station

Because to no one’s surprise

The one in the car isn’t working

Years after we finally buried us

It has me still pondering,

Was it you and I who didn’t work

Or YouAndI that could never last

 

 

It’s truly the end of the era

As we watch those final scenes of a series

Whose magic of storytelling

And beauty of friendship

You introduced me to some seven years ago

You have a similar, uncanny ability

To weave with your words

Flights of fancy or daggers that kill

And to rouse troops to battle

When most eventually disappeared

In the hardest fight for my life

You stepped in when I needed

Those shoulders of support the most

With food to nourish the body

Or words to feed the soul

 

 

We traded places from the days

When you looked to me for strength

For comfort and a virtual shoulder to cry on

During those final days of your sister’s life

The house that was once mine is not the same

As I walk through the door—and why should it be

You built a family here; your daughter’s clothes

And toys stake their claim in every room

Whenever you speak of her, there is a fierce pride

A miraculous new side of you that I don’t recognize

My leopard cat runs when he hears me call his name

It stings but I don’t blame him for changing loyalties

Would I have been so easy to forgive if someone

I loved with all my being left me so permanently behind

With you, it took years, more grief

Other losses and heartbreaks before

You would allow me to even hear your voice again

How easily we fall into old routines

Like actors jumping back into a well worn play

Yet bringing to the roles a maturity

New techniques we each have learned

On unfamiliar stages from foreign mentors

Later—limbs intertwined

Our breaths and Dave Matthews rising

From the old-school jukebox

Bringing back memories of those

Smoke-filled dens and the clack of cue balls

And your friends lining it up

For a sniff in the back room

It’s funny how time and distance

Takes the steam out of all that now

There is nor desire to relive those days

Nor do I regret the years that followed

But resentments lie buried in the past

What remains are the happy memories

And the new ones we create now

In the most precarious of friendships

Gravedigger, when you dig our grave,

Could you make it shallow

So that we can feel the rain?

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