Saw you again

over the wine and canapés,

and it was as though you

were dead to me all over again.

Your shining eyes were locked

with some other bloke’s and I

thought, ‘Shite, not again.’

 

Except there is no again,

and it’s my well-crafted lie

to believe that you were alive

to me. Then you came over and said ‘Hi’;

I echoed the same, lamely,

and you said how glad you were that I survived.

 

The only thing that survived

was that thing we’d told ourselves

about romance and ‘being together’.

I gather, that was your amusing fabrication,

and I keep that burning thought alive

like a mangy moose’s head over a fireplace,

 

Yes, you, the one who didn’t

partake in all the bullshit everyone else did.

Such a good story that I began to live it

too. Our history, except not yours at all, 

and who’s laughing now? You are, as you were,

into his mouth and out my door.

 

Wasn’t it fine? But your most impressive

accomplishment was to remain alive. Not to 

say part of me died. It was too late to turn the tide.

I no longer seemed able to choose what I

ought to believe - and isn’t it nice to know

I’m the one who ditched the bride?

 

And now we sit down and you smile,

and something changes within me. Because,

then, that fantasy almost springs to life,

then smoulders, sputters and collapses in smoke.

Once burned, twice wise, is what I should have surmised.

You say, ‘Isn’t it nice?’ and I don’t reply,

wondering if I have emerged alive