Roses dipped in the sealing wax pools of memory And voices echoed in the long corridor of years – But now young Jammie’s dying, Jack knife in his liver, lying prone, almost gone, His hand but one second too short To snatch the marrow bone. „God be thanked, whether taking or giving,„ said Mona Stooping to grope the blade out of her brother’s side. Then she kissed his sightless sockets While searching in his pockets feeling grown, Feeling for the marrow bone. Like cigarette ashes we break under weight of our lightness When seels on voices in the echoes that died through years Are broken in a singer, They come out and they linger vain and lone, Eager and unable to resist the lure