EPIPHANY

The burning of the houses — J. M. W. Turner

The days of stormy autumn come
Mother, child, brother, son,
Memories, like dust, infest my eyes,
Swirling, like Turner’s skies;
Like water under wind,
Mixing greys and blacks, whites and blues,
A chiaroscuro, tussling monochromes
Into the piebald skies of heavens above.

Below, girls in dirty summer dresses,
Chase boys with unruly mothers,
Fathers absent, except in dreams,
O! Where do all their shadows go?

Late summer, blackberrying down languorous lanes leads to a
Kiss, a passing form of bliss,
I’m dancing with winter’s handmaidens
A dancing frenzy unfreezes
The ice crystals of my mind and heart,
In wind-swept hospital corridors we part
Stripped bare all that the human heart endures.