shot glass
title
Issue # 8 September 2012
"... brevity is the soul of wit ..."
- William Shakespeare

Bio


A British poet, Andy S. Barritt has work published or forthcoming in various publications, including Ink Sweat & Tears, Message in a Bottle and The Prose-Poem Project. He has an MA in Buddhist Studies and is a keen amateur ornithologist. andysbarritt.wordpress.com.


Andy S. Barritt


 

No, she said

The cancer spread fast, a bloom of thunder
in the sky's grey water.
Our year stopped then, turned back to winter;
the tenderness of columbines limned in frost.

Holding you I spread storm-drenched wings;
a falcon mantling her dying young
under the severed gaze of a blackbird,
yellow throat still open in silenced alarm.

You died just before the arrival of the first swift,
slipping out between banks of rain
as we gathered around your bedside,
trees whispering at the edges of a clearing.

Only your daughter-in-law spoke your name
in a song-like voice.