Footnotes*
It was mostly during the summer months,
when arriving early before class
we'd dart across from college,
ducking under the sun that made
the street glisten and shimmer
like cathode heat, into a dark building. Then up
the stairs, past the first morning
whiff at the coffee house,
towards the bookshop. But before
that, the room on the left where
he sat, large spaces around him stacked with books. A proof-reader,
I thought. Or small-time editor;
his white head bent over the text,
adding a note here and there.
Never looking up. Light settling like
the thick dust on his shelves. And today the heat returns to
another summer, with nothing
but these lines to stand in for
ten years, his white memory,
for our lost innocence.
And all forgetting.
when arriving early before class
we'd dart across from college,
ducking under the sun that made
the street glisten and shimmer
like cathode heat, into a dark building. Then up
the stairs, past the first morning
whiff at the coffee house,
towards the bookshop. But before
that, the room on the left where
he sat, large spaces around him stacked with books. A proof-reader,
I thought. Or small-time editor;
his white head bent over the text,
adding a note here and there.
Never looking up. Light settling like
the thick dust on his shelves. And today the heat returns to
another summer, with nothing
but these lines to stand in for
ten years, his white memory,
for our lost innocence.
And all forgetting.
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