By Lyra Button
I was dove;
you were air
and I was happy to fall
as you held me between fingers
Spreading my wings, setting me to fly.
You are gone.
And I am the jackal
piecing away at its own feathers.
Til I’m just a pile of bones,
strangely living.
Bright dead things, the stars of the night.
Old dreams preserved in the silver shadows
of the night’s scars.
A sadness is not always an ugly thing.
So I look to stars
find my north and fly.
And I remember you
as a smile
edging towards a tear.
A sadness is not always an ugly thing.
Now I am something beyond
the bones of being alive.
I am night:
tumour dark; still shining.