...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HyPH7gamb2o&ab_channel=l0user

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He smelled like pressed linen: 

Like folded fabric and the faded,

Distant memory

Of laundry soap, of yesterday’s washing,

Of the clothesline, of wooded-pins

And the wind that was used

To dry it.

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He smelled of hair oil, and cured tobacco;

He smelled of shoe polish, and the subtle hint

Of the spirit that he’d been drinking;

He smelled of brass buttons

And leather - of care and order,

Of the delicate stability

That comes from organization and structure,

Of a slight smile, a cautionary touch,

Of the reassuring cadence

Of his quietly emitted laughter.

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He smelt like a man - like my man,

Like a man

Proper - and as we swayed amidst the crowd

With his hand wrapped gently

Round the soft, cotton recesses

Of my blue, summer dress, 

With our shoes and their adjacence

And with my arms draped 

Across the pliance of 

His shoulders …

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I sighed - 

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Beauty in the eyes of

The beholder - and as a sigh to last

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A lifetime.

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