Josephine

Josephine, I liked how you sent me flowers,

because, girls don’t usually send those gifts.

The vase is still there, the flowers have now wilted,

they’re my sole material memory of you.

I’m unshaven for fifteen days or thereabouts.

My hair is matting, my armpits they reek.

I haven’t moved from this chair for what seems a lifetime.

I haven’t watched the TV to which I’m always attached.

Josephine, you cannot realise my remorse –

I didn’t mean to drive all that fast.

Seatbelt unfastened, you flew through the windscreen –

I watched, gawping, silent, as your young life shot past.