In Memoriam Poem by Jen Hadfield

‘No metaphors swarm

around that fact, around that strangest thing,
that being that was and now no longer is.'
Iain Crichton Smith


I

For it is not like a sea of nested gas
that you float upon
in your pedalo.

This unspeakable is not like
anything

a poem or riddle collies no particle
of it for us to fank
in mouths and minds.

A noun's a nickname
and makes it reestit

adjectives salt, parch and wizen it.
Language abdicates

but you
in your stocking feet
stand a chance

with your long-lost primer
of liquids and vowels.


II

Loving language is wide
and shallow: sooks, polches
and wistens it.

Already I can only noun
about its shores
and surfaces

nym the brinks of this squilly thing

where congregates stuff
that can be likened:

stiff hands like ginger root
in the dim, summer night;

the kettle's glossy coat of tar;
the little flame of the driftwood fire

bunched
and clerical.


III

First we'll need
to agree:

are we taking up the first language
or must we coin
a new one?

If we're going to speak about this
I'll need a tinderbox and tent
and waterskin.

We will need to use the nights
as fully as the nesting birds.