proximity

I found that photograph
you sent me
just before we met

you were sitting alone with a group of friends
turned away
from the man on your immediate left

and I wondered who he might have been
with his close cropped hair
and shadowy chin

though obviously I am older
in some ways
I think I look like him

he sat in close proximity
though to you he was quite unknown

in the vicinity of our undoing
we whispered on the telephone

I suffer no more the longing
to put right
wrongs of the past

all has been forgiven now

I see clearly
there can be peace at last

a murmuration of starlings

we sang harsh songs to each other
made our strange movements in the shrill

air
at last descending to low complaint
that found no forgiveness

anywhere
I would have painted grass green for you
my heart forever

scorned
now can’t paint sky without cloud
nor put sun there to offer

warmth
hard to reconcile as evening gathers in

only a child could do that
as only a child

will
the sky grows ever crazier
in bewildering

display
a murmuration of starlings that with darkness

falls away