My Santiago

Exuding confidence, Reassurance, That things will get better;

Though they won’t, Not for her, nor for him,

as he forgets the mundane, But not the past,

And never his ‘girl’ across the corridor,

Not his, but still sharing more of a common life,

Shared pain, Ultimate loss,

than her partner - in life, Living in adjacent worlds, Nursing treasured memories, Of his ‘girl’, The one with whom he skied the world, Proposed to in that house In a bygone Adelaide post - breakfast morning;

But the tryst grows, Giving her hope and company, Him a girl to comfort And her partner, The permission To let go, incrementally, Of his version of her, Yet loving her more, Through this act; Loss of memory, of life, Of certainty, Giving rise to the whimsy of a new kind of purer love.