Vale

for Ulick King
Greengrocer and black prince in shrilling choir
Respond from the dark trees that line the road
To the long throbbing cadence of desire
That ends the Sapphic Ode.
I can still feel the keys and see the score;
You take time out to roll a cigarette;
I hear your crutches creak across the floor.
You've nothing to regret:
You brought no accusation against life;
It was no crippled self you chose to wear,
And that warm courage drew to you a wife
Most nobly fit to share
The sensual strength of deep organic love,
The root and thorn and crimson of the rose.
The end was a decline. What does that prove?
There's no melodic close.
Your mother took you as a stricken child
To a faith-healer, hoping in despair.
Later she couldn't quite be reconciled
As you outgrew her care.
But your great laughing strength was first her own;
And in those years when we were closest friends
She gave me kindness as another son.
Somehow it never ends:
Kindness and courage like a stream flow on
Into the living. Grief dries out, the pain
Fades too. The honours that our flesh has won
Like flowering trees remain.
The pulsing clang of the cicada choir
Fulfils the night: I am back thirty years;
Your voice throbs in the cadence of desire
To silence beyond tears.