HOLDING ON

This morning
I burnt all the old photos
of you and I. Catharsis:
I feel lighter now. The White Horse
is no longer out of bounds. I am free
to return there, only now without you.

Memories fighting for supremacy. Mentally
I'm shutting them out. I say no
to nostalgia - it is the ultimate torturer.

I can see the heaps of rubble from here
on the back road. It's like
your apartment block never existed. Yet it did.
At least they'll erect something new in it's place.
But every midsummer
my mind will dance there - a ghost out of time.
I feel like crying - and laughing: you and I
attending the Summer Ball in all our finery...



My ball gown, moldering in the closet:
decades of neglect.
I catch myself wishing
I could donate it to charity.
It is the last tangible connection.

I know I ought just to do it.
So why, oh why, can I not?