SALEM VARDRE

He gave me a piece of advice

swiftly followed 

four years later by another.

He being unrushed 

in his twilight years

I having the speed 

of a six year old

Little did I realise the effect 

he would have upon my soul.

I was his apprentice 

when we visited Salem Vardre

I ran to the compost heap

with dead flowers

and was the bearer 

of fresh water 

in an empty milk bottle

that always seemed 

to be there, waiting.

I now realise that in

sending his errand boy

he had time to whisper

words of love he may

have wished he'd spoken

before she was taken away.

Dead leaves and dead petals

gathered above his dead wife

and my departed grandmother. 

Reviews

[SquinklaPsyOps]

Measured and brilliantly rendered

I like the descriptive creativity of the poem

And the easeness in which it concludes in a sentimental approach