Elegy for My Friend Who Was, among Other Things, an Orchestra Conductor
By Ben Purkert
A week apart, our birthdays
formed a bridge. They always fell
at the best time: snow over flowers
like thoughts scattered suddenly
over the phone. You want to know
his name? He was the beautiful friend,
the loudmouth, the one whose voice
shook the walls until the house
began laughing. He could’ve picked
anyone to love, and the world
would’ve agreed. In the end, flowers
thinned silence into their stems.
And the night sky? The rising moon?
Like a blank slip of paper, and yet
signed. I still can’t bring myself
to tell you his name, to lay it here
in the cold wet earth of this poem.
But I can sound it out. Two bells
ringing—not exactly in sync,
but together all the same.
