The Empty Loft

[Frank E Gibbard]

A cold wind nipped across the Pennines,

it was a bleak one this day he reckoned,

Tom tugged his muffler tight to his neck.

Withering cold and no prospects of much

to warm the cockles at all any time soon.

Weary, his homing pigeon, was a goner,

high time to admit the raw pain to himself

no more craning in anticipation of the dot.

She'd been a jewel, best ever bird bar none.

more of a friend to this old man than his ex.

Weary, always the fast friend, loyal worker,

the non-fancier would not know the frisson

holding an exhausted homer up in two hands

against your cheek feeling a rapid heart beat

staying beside the loft two creatures in sleep.

The loft vacant but for a few stray feathers,

undeniably the partnership was terminated.

Tom pressed a single feather into the pages

of the flying log which he shut incomplete

no arrival time being entered for the flight,

that last blighted journey to hang as mystery

like those thousands of miles winged away.

[tonyv]

Very touching, Frank. I like the pigeon's name ... Weary. :) The poem makes me want to get one, but it seems like a big responsibility and a lot of work. Plus, it would just make me sad when, inevitably, "the partnership" is "terminated."

 

Tony

[Frank E Gibbard]

Thank you Tony.

[dr_con]

Frank,

 

An impressive portrait- poignant and beautiful. Very impressed by your ability to home in on a theme and fully immerse the reader in the moment.

 

Excellent!

 

DC&J

[Frank E Gibbard]

Thanks doctor for the feedback. I am bucked to receive acceptance of the poem as its form of prose epxression gave me grief from a complainer elsewhere who disavowed this "prose poem" and all such with much passion. cheers, Frank.

Edited November 26, 2009 by Frank E Gibbard