Brother, when the raven came for me

last night in its black cassock, when my breath

was sweetened with dreaming, I heard you

call to me in that bell-clear treble, Roy,

Roy, and knew there would be no peace, as if

we were still boys swinging in hammocks

against a withering sunset. I reached out

a hand to your voice, hoping to be held & steadied

against the bitter losses, but was stung by the keen

edge of an absence. Forty years since we

laid you down to sleep with the poppies, each

year governed by a distinct shoreline

that the waves’ pale wings, unfolding, have failed

to erase. But the failing is ours, too. It’s what

the living do best. Last Friday, madness tore

like teeth into this country’s history as bullets rained

and erased the warmth of 51 faces all lit with hope

and faith. Why are the prayers of the hopeful

always answered with violence? The media hurried

to explain the blood away—racial tension / unchecked

immigration / mental unsoundness—but

the blood clung to the prayer mats like a sun

that refuses to set. Brother, I know you’d say to this

with that familiar ironic smile, Nothing will ever truly

wash the dark stain off men’s hearts, as surely you’d go on

labouring in the streets of Southall, your body

an arrow through every injustice. Here in Napier

all I have is a circle of white pines to sit amongst

as the last light winds down to a wine-dark

bruise over the horizon. When the wind rises

the sand veils the air, each grain etched

with the echo of your name.