Friend Peter

by Bruce Holsapple

Opened window by the sink
dark wind clattering
thru wood blinds —
reminds me, washing dishes,
of an island breeze
& it is, sort of, me isolated
in the desert highlands

follow the associations:    wind kitchen light
shades (shad) ocean    Long Island beach
friend Peter
dead now 16 years

Us sitting on a windy beach
looking out at a bungalow
way back, where a writer we knew
used to spend weekends, an expensive getaway
thinking him privileged —

Inside that getaway myself now
how the wheel’s spun round
Peter haunting me
the mixed sense of exile
& occasion

big windows, tile floor
a privileged view
by fact of these dry stony mountains
the reddish landscape
scattered juniper

puts a hitch in my step
stops my breath
walking out on the porch at dawn