Heady as Spanish champagne, the
Autumn air.
A falling fir cone hits my shoulder
reminding me of picnics in Andalusia.
You always wore strappy glitzy
sandals,
killer heels when driving those
pine-scented hills.
Film star glamour, whooshy skirts
were yours
jangly earrings, carmine reddened
lips.
Christmas envelopes for me spilled
trinkets
bangles, a necklace of coloured
glass
…and the American dresses,
all sequins, lace,
shimmering petticoats to fuel
my schoolgirl
fancies of rocking rolling and
romancing.
Your hands that last time shocked
me.
Your hands, (nails once cherry-varnished)
now skeletal, barely covered
by a gauze of flesh.
I never knew a hand held so
many tiny bones.
From your window we watch bulldozers
shudder the foundations of an
old church
in favour of underground parking
space.
No locals chatter in the Plaza
or seek their shade
beneath orange trees smoked
in yellow dust.
Unable to lift a glass of water,
whose cup
once bubbled with champagne
and craic
you lie, ankles splintery as
dried pine needles.
Eithne Cavanagh
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