Kate Ashton
aftermath
i.m. Gerrit Offringa (1943 -2019) i we let him slow into the clay knowing he hated to be cold how he had longed for Italy dying as verdancy tipped the trees in the days he loved best while nearby the nurserymen tended their trays of tricolour heartsease and gave us leave to stand his resurrection at stripped altar end of their little praying place his branching man his Christ they knew to whom we knelt as in his new hewn cupboard bed he lay our atheist our lovely loss our friend ii a quiet farewell no stranger spoke no prayer beneath the bell each in turn we threw red clods upon him easily enough the sun stroked bright his terracotta lair he knew we met his one request to lie a short stone’s throw from work and home his keen eye the wild violet beside the path he saw we bore him widdershins twice round the bare brick tower to banish the old evil ones and some soft nimbus greened his reaching Christ iii periwinkle seashine bitter east wind up on the dyke such a fine man we drink his local café dry she sets a small stone there where his heart is now i nothing soon many times lost in some small town we’ll hear news of atrocity think of brother stranger friend the possibility of death by accident in the synagogue she shows a visitor the pointing finger of the scroll as though goodness and guilt were ever so simple i seek the mikveh iv he visits me although i am not home he listens takes his time to speak he lights a cigarette agrees to tea goes back to bed he sleeps away my day i go to the sea come home cold to his kitchen throw open grey on grey rinse coffee cups wine glasses search the old pot plant for drooping candelas of waxen scent hear footsteps on the stairs he comes quietly in assents to my presence soon we shall talk v his diver plummets featherwards in wonder at the mercy of the sea Christ plants his feet on earth again pegged pulsing veins proud of the flesh and at his side a searing pain sore thirst like friendlessness he took no rest from working day or night glanced sidelong soft at this new guest we spoke of worlds of water and of clay unpeopled spaces that Spinoza knew the ecstasy of solitude where each small thing reveals the whole vi i go home overnight by sea she sends a photo of bluebells i her one of my family i don’t know where i am i am not in he does not ring and leave silence on the machine he must be working maybe asleep i do not want to disturb him she stops reading at one to call and tell him where she is remembers takes a pill his Christ is sold but cannot leave until all coin is counted in however low we sink he knows his breath has stopped the world holds us afloat above our sin we go on loving him vii wondrous how his house filled up with iterations of that face a glimpse of immortality bestowed to salve the day he knows that he has passed this way before a place where prophesy imparts the path occludes the moment and departs he climbs as humbly as a saint step by step up to the sea raises arms and gaze to meet migratory March sky clear burdened blue shot through with loss walks out unpiloted across fast running sand and light away from worldly night |
Wachter II (2003)
Image: John Stoel Courtesy the estate of Gerrit Offringa |
© Copyright Kate Ashton 2020
Kate Ashton was born in Beith and is a writer and translator. She lived and worked for nearly 25 years in the Netherlands before returning to Scotland in 2003. Her poems have appeared in UK magazines including THE SHOp, Agenda, Shearsman and Long Poem Magazine, and her first collection, Who by Water, came out from Shearsman Books in 2016. Her work has appeared previously in Molly Bloom 20.