Many of Helen’s friends at the 2019 French Quarter Fest, thinking of her.
A Suite for Miss Helen: From Subject to Object 6/21/2013
Sitting in the garden
Side by side
Watching the birds
Listening to the clarinet
Dancing to the bass
While Miss Helen sings of Avalon
With lyrical bits snatched from the abyss
By a melody
Buried safely in neurons
Yet to be lost.
And I wonder what …
What I would have thought
If I had known
Twenty years ago
When first we danced
That I would be here
Side by side
With Miss Helen
Wheelchair bound
Mind adrift
Dancing in the ruins
Watching her slow transition
From subject to object.
And I wonder
What I should think
Knowing what I know
Seeing what I see
Myself in a garden
Counting the birds
Wheelchair bound
Dancing in the ruins
Twenty years hence
When my turn comes
To make the transition
From subject to object.
_____
© Reece Burka 2/1/2019
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