FOR JACK SADLER - GUILTY by P R Ford, November 2013
Do you feel guilty for being
alive?
For seeing a day which he did not
see?
For feeling the chill of Autumn’s
breath
As the raucous groans of rooks in
the tree
Echo across barren fields, yet not
Bursting through air like a rifle
shot?
Do you feel guilty for growing old?
Or welcome the ache of the swollen
thumb
Fore-running the pain? – Sweet agony
looms,
Not sudden, like flesh torn open
and raw,
Nor lethal as chemicals which
suddenly blow -
But slow and insidious. - He will
not know.
His aging is there on memorial
stone
Which weathers and yellows as
memory fades.
His smile, cut off, will not lose
its shape
As the photo curls or the image gapes.
Don’t cut it! Enhance it, love and
embrace
His life, his youth, his darling
face –
Oh yes! I feel guilty.