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Lynne Savitt

GIVING UP THE GHOST

                for a.m.


did you get the card for the memorial

our friend, noel, "celebration of a life

most thoughtfully lived" what will they

say about us i ask you as we raise

martini glasses & light a joint looking

at photos of all our old lovers eleven

boxes in the decades we've known each

other's lovers cowboys, convicts, poets,

professors, artists, mechanics, doctors,

chefs, motorcycle racers, an indian chief

& an actor we never thought this day would

come as you are to the service for once

illuminating beauty but dulled by wind &

sun mapped faces once juicy as our sex lives

now dry as feet we cream with aloe & shea

butter me up with kind words praising a life

of thoughtless pursuit & dwindling resources

oh, but the sweet memory & exaggeration of

love lies in stories bloated purple with details

how gentle & obsessed he was, how virile &

devoted our tales become classic swill but

our mirrors don't lie look at us corpses in

training big red smears for mouths never

close the coffin & sing me a dirge wrap me

in gold flecked red velvet use movie camera

to capture event i promise if you go first i'll

take the sea green tulle & sequined scallop

shells float you on a gardenia covered kayak

either way, sweet pal, don't let the legends

fade crying old lovers pulled from graves &

life to mourn us most dramatically queens

of poetry & passion may we live forever


[Index]

Thunder Sandwich #26 - Summer/Fall 2005