George Drew

She admits she is haunted, but does so softly, as if she really believes spirits will overhear her, spirits that neither she nor I believe in. I’m haunted, too, but standing before a window, its glass all that separates us, keeps us safe from the spirits we could never imagine swirling upward like protoplasmic spectral

Discussing death is not high on our list,
not after a year of not talking at all,

Shuffling and cutting the deck, he fumbles,his fingers laggards, each follow-througha synaptic aberration, his hit you? morelike hoodoo, his I raise like whoosh,his call like auk, consonants not beingnegotiable, vowels as soft as snowflakes.Despite the drool worming its waydown the right side of his chinand the upper lip tugging his mouth upto a crooked smile,

1972–2012 Irony the enemy unto death of truth,history his unflinching gaze, the lyricalfrontal assault his arsenal: not the bird,not the song of the bird, but the beak,talons, feathers and wings of the bird.And wouldn’t you know, today I heardof his passing, today with my headburied in the slender body of his poems,those little fickle songbirds