Elegy for Tamara

four years
to the day
yesterday

				so open
					we all were such lilting

						young lungs  that tattered

guitar twangy strings
hunched over in constant

				tuning how is it
				that I can see you

							cradled over acoustic
							body going back & forth

hands up
& down
all along
fret board 
a chord			a series of notes 	curls unfolding in a sway  of 

         afternoon light


certainly 
your voice          yet  now   
                    when I see 			an old photo


							of you 
                                                        there is 
                                                                hush

	as if replaying memory on mute


four years since
you died almost		30 years 		since we lived in 

			the same house

		dogwoods in bloom
		like we used to see				in Jersey


the cherry blossoms
in a day or so
will be mostly 
leaves

				but today is 
				not Jersey
				not Eugene			just me


sun obscured by apartment buildings

					but the light still floods,


with an open window
on a spring morning


				setting your ghost    free to breathe