a persisting of memory on the G.W.R.

can the magic of old dreams be revived?

 

as my train leaves Plymouth for Penzance

I picture Clara pottering a garden

tending clumps of campion, angelica,

and celandine

 

she is wearing a battered panama

against the evening sun-bake

bleaching the blue-washed walls

of the cottage overlooking Carbis Bay

she said she set her heart upon

 

does she remember parasol picnics

in meadows of asphodel?

wasps at our honey?

 

that time her arm was covered

by a shroud of ladybirds?

 

I brought wine, but no corkscrew,

she said, ‘just push it through’,

a splatter of Rose dashed the front

of her lace white dress

 

does she remember the first time

she said she loved me?

 

the words bubbled out walking

the shaded winding path

leading to the fallen tree-trunk

where generations of lovers,

gazed at sunsets promising,

 

‘this moment, us, will last forever’

 

nights under tartan rugs

beneath the willow cupola

kissing the ground

 

Clara’s night-breath brushing my face,

my breath warming hers

 

we never touched

for

our bower was a sacred place

 

searching times past

the joy the pain

if we met again

might we fall back into love

is that possible?

 

does she remember August days,

the innocence of

morning swims in the meander

riverbed mud sucking our feet

a tickle of reeds snaking our toes?

 

Clara saw a water rat and screamed

it scuttled down a hideaway hole

I reached in after to show

there was nothing to fear

 

she washed my bloody finger

with soda water

and tore an underskirt

bandage strip

 

we never bathed there again

 

those days love alone was enough,

no thoughts of tomorrow,

or children that might follow

 

the train enters a tunnel

mirrored in the window

my face is gaunt with age

and desolation

 

was the path ever as windy

the willow so homely

the meadow so perfumed

the wine as red

the stream so warm

as I remember?

 

perhaps she relives memories

of what we had before we parted

 

like we said we never would.