Where Once You Stood Poem by Edward Clapham

Where once you stood

I glance across the room to where once you stood,
busy with the evening meal, intent on the rhythms
of preparation, glass of wine close at hand;
Barber's haunting andante unfolds in my head,
the oboe's sad note counterpoint to my happiness.

You would look up, smiling, and catch me gazing at
your graceful form; slender legs, the gentle curve of
breast and hip, the arch of your eyebrows.
I hold these memories close to me,
they are my anchors that berth me in hope.

The irrepressible Miss distracts me from my reverie,
with demand to play, to enter her madcap world,
full of laughter, flying limbs, and innocence.
But always there is you, full of contradiction,
with promises and loving words, and yet false.

You speak. "Trust me" you say often, and in time
I do; a blind leap of faith into opportunity,
far from the safety of solitude. "Go slowly",
you say, and I rein in my joyful enthusiasm,
puzzled and unsure how but obedient and willing.

"Trust me" you say, but where is your trust or,
better still, your determination to see things through,
to hold uncertainty inside and enter into the chaos
of compromise, the tension of priorities stretched
and changed, with all the anxiety that brings.

Once you stood there, on a threshold between
independence and life fulfilled, but drew back, retreated
into the safety of work, and in time into aloneness,
save for that young Miss, a joy for anyone,
and the comforting rituals of each day.

I puzzle still. Was it sudden realisation of
the gulf of age, the lack of that fiery spark
that makes another irresistible, or some forbidden
fear that blurs father and partner; or was
it simple motherhood, that provided reason enough.

I glance again at where once you stood
and miss the electric bond of presence, the anticipation
of two souls, two futures, two paths that
yet entwine, separate but one, point and counterpoint;
an elegant argument for life.

Edward Clapham
December 2014