I thought that you had died. Were dead.

So I set off to find a house

for just us two, your wife and child.

I reached a village built on rock.

that faced a seething wind-wracked sea

and climbed past jumble to the top,

and found you there alive and flush

opening a door for me.

‘Come in.’ you said, ‘Come meet my love.’

You led me up a spiral stair

inside a tower made of stone

with slits for light. And it grew dark,

too dark to see your other wife.

But I could hear and feel her breathe.

‘And so,’ I said, ‘you’ve a new life.’

Then I was taken with the thought

that you had found the place we sought

when you and I shared dreams and talked.

But you – and I should have known

the soul that wanders finds a home –

wordless, returned me to the road.

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Teaching EFL  I listen mostly.

Something learned the year we lost Allende .

My class was filled with refugees from Chile.

The students had a lot of things to tell me

about the world they’d made – their new democracy.

Teaching them, I learned to listen mostly.

Pinochet sent his henchmen for Allende,

the ‘comrade President’ who refused to flee.

My class was packed with refugees from Chile.

They hid the worst. I helped with phrasing mostly,

though facts leaked out about the Juncta’s ugly deeds.

In London teaching, I learned to listen mostly.

I heard that Victor Jara went down singing

his last song – this with both hands broken.

I lived that year as if my home were Chile

and I expected Britain to protect me

until our land was freed of A. Pinochet.

My class was filled with refugees from Chile.

Teaching EFL I listen mostly.

EFL - English as Foreign Language

In 1973, Salvador Allende, President of Chile, and the singer Victor Jara, died in the coup staged by General Augusta Pinochet.

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We were young.  No one bothered

much with clothes.  You tried a few

other girls before we met

but none passed the test you set:

what mattered was how you slept.

With me, you professed to rest.

So the marriage we grew into

which failed so many other tests

and tested us until the last

lasted until death.

And now undressed and wrapped in sheets,

I move from bed to bed to couch

as if reproached by sleep itself.

I lie awake and watch the dark.

I watch a thousand things unseen.

And when the cat returns at dawn

and he curls up, I think of us

as once we slept. Then I could rest.

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I sleep and hold your hand

and hold your hand in sleep.

And there the moon slides in.

The eucalyptus breathes.

The garden shed grows tall,

taller than the hedge.

And years roll on, roll on

until we have no years.

Then like blossom floats

an alphabet of dust.

I hold your hand in sleep.

I sleep and hold your hand.

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