Thus have I killed you

And thus
have I killed you
a hundred times:
stalked your corpse
among the living;
ripped the soul
from your dead flesh
in some imagined resurrection.


Thus have I killed you
a thousand times and more
when every face I see
in some small way
reflects a part of you:
the line of jaw;
the velvet camber
of a sallow cheek.



Thus have I killed you,
oh, ten thousand times
and mourned your death afresh
for dead you are
it seems
four decades gone
or so they say
though I did never see you dead:
never measured your length
upon a slab;
just some old box we tucked away
into the ground -
a time capsule of a life.



And every woman
still
spotted from this bus
though two hundred miles away
in years and space
for a fleeting moment
breaks nature's rule
and feeds my futile heart
with desperate hope
that hers might be your face.