CALL OF BIRDS 1916

A MAID IN A HOUSE IN 1916 MISSING THE MAN SHE LOVES AND IS WOUNDED BY WAR

There's a stillness
in his room.

Dust it well, Polly,
Gripe told me.

Smell of stale air,
mothballs, old smoke
still there.

The bed where we lay
and made love,
now still and vacant.

He away broken by war
and death seen
and felt at close quarters,
in some hospital
for wounds of body
and mind from war's touch
and hurl
and dug out flesh.

I sit on the bed
and muse of him there
and holding me
and kissing.

He would put a finger
to my lips and say:
hush Polly,
and his moustache
would tickle me
and his hands invade me
to a deep pleasure.

I bounce the bed gently.

When he was home last
(before the breakdown came)
he asked me up to his room
and it was so warm
and soft and him
kissing my neck
and slowly
each inch of me.

Now the room
is empty of him,
the bed a tomb
of where we were.

I hug a pillow to my breast,
kiss the cloth,
pretend it's him there,
holding him close,
closing eyes
and breathing out words.

Outside the window
the call of morning birds.