Regards to Bruce (Who Distanced Himself)

by James A. Gardner




.
.
"I met a seer, who sent his spirit."
   --Walt Whitman
.
.
When I see him again in the steamroom,
this panhandle Texan on loan to my city, 
his (evening) path a primrose to emigrate, 
We speak; our selves a child muse 
inspiratory in the eyes of midnight.
.
He'd like now to share such things 
once refused with shyness and fear.
One is an apparition (phantom). 
Two is an ideal (eidolon).
.
He had misgivings about his course, 
a mild panic that shorted our path,
spoke of times since that thoughts 
of me had occupied his mind:
Was I still reading poetry? 
The utility of which was questionable?
.
His regrets an explanation and this 
too-late intrigue with me a vanity
to redeem the faltered conscience.
The boy now grown from the man has
understood that when eyes sear 
those selfsame burn in his mirror.
.
But there remains ...alone...
the inert Moon and this base philosophy. 
Whose letters to practical men are
a hope of phasing this real world?
.
Hell is everyday w/out the beloved. 
.
Bruce met a seer who sent his 
spirit and then the merge.
.
.
21 April 1996




©1996, by James A. Gardner

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