Of those I think I have seen for the last time
you are who camps in my mind unmoving; the
lazy smoke of your fire heavy on the still morning
spreads unsure if it might settle or lift. The last
time, we were on a train and Marseille was an
idea in the distance. You said there are streets
in the old town no one should wander down and
sat back in your seat returning to a thought derailed,
righting it said, it’s an absence of distance comme
la pornographie. But I cannot recall what it was we
were discussing. Your philosophy was a road I looked
down, familiar but stretching too far; turning, I saw
you from above so close, your eyes behind your glasses
like two turtles unsure if they might venture forth or
withdraw. And now rumours reach me from the distance
time has carved like a fissure between us of you bent
by the weight of your knowing, worries conundrumming
like the slow drip of water until they wear paths that
no one should travel; lost you blink in the sunlight
shielding your eyes from what you imagine is there. Is it
an absence of distance between the observer and the
observed, a moment caught unaware, naked in the crisp
morning and so startled, cannot move on?