JUDE GOODWIN

Goodbye

I heard you say goodbye
in a dream, your voice
was strange, a kind of sliding
sand sound, like that of a bank
alongside the river, and then stones
unearthed and loose, or bones
freed by a landslide,
rolling towards my belly,
as if I were standing, hip deep
in cold water, salmon rubbing
themselves against my shins,
as if I were looking up at you
and your voice filled the world,
or was so small only a dog
could hear, lift its black ear
and turn your way. I heard you
like the snapping of cottonwoods
overhead, like the great wings
of an eagle circling
its roost, like the wet
folding of a fisherman’s coat sleeve
as he casts one more time,
and the singing he hears
as his hook and line
leave him, lift up
over the clean currents,
flash and disappear.

First published in Halfway Down the Stairs, December 2011.

Follow me on Twitter & Facebook