Maksym

Photo: Maksym Tymchyk

Maksym

A friend died last week
on duty, a car accident;
the news of death still surprises me, 
still catches me out.
Memories reflect on my mind like willows
bending down from the river's bank  
peering at their distorted selves 
trailing curious fingers in eddying pools

The last time we met
five of us gathered around
a bottle of honeyed whiskey 
You gave me a photograph, 
a black spruce forest
shrouded in night's quiet snow 
dawn's mist wrapped mythic 'round a
lone, log-hewn Hutsul-made cabin,
a signature and date on linen-white border
it has moved with me unframed
for three years since; an itinerant talisman.

You were buried Saturday 
before I knew you had died. 
Bound under oak and carried 
down potholed village streets where
hundreds knelt or stood in salute. 
And while you lay there
against Kyiv's thawing breast, 
we gather memories like broken glass 
and weep
I think I will keep your photograph
free from frame