In the apple market
your south London twang
accompanied the many undulations
of time.

Your wild androgyny
mirrored the mirror
of yourself
skimming off the water
of childhood,
like a shaking dog.

You lit up, spot-lighted,
an iridescence of sound
Ziggy!

Your songs were the water
I needed;
Your terse verse
spread underground
watering imaginations
breeding rainbows
over Baker Street during the long hot summer of 1976.

We thought it would never end
but you knew better
ashes to ashes
dust to dust
before the silver cord was broken
before the golden bowl was crushed.