A Place in Space and Time

Tonight Professor Brian Cox

is taking me to Venice – 

and I can't believe it's 19 years 

since I went there in my own body, 

and saw the glass-blowing at Murano too,

and visited Renaissance paintings

huge on old palace walls.

So many years ago and still so vivid!

The husband of my heart 

was with me then.

Now the long-limbed Professor,

laughing with boyish delight,

takes me up to the heavens –

the moon, the planets, the stars,

the Milky Way; the Earth from space

rising in a half-circle, swelling like fruit – 

an apricot, an apple ... but it's blue.

And I begin to think instead

of my blue-eyed husband – now an angel,

wandering the stars without me.

The title belongs to Episode 4 of the BBC's 'Human Universe With Brian Cox'.

I'm linking this to Midweek Motif ~ Nostalgia at  Poets United

Coming to Rest

I was in Venice with you, and

Kathmandu with you, and Cusco

with you — beloved cities.

They are gone now, irrecoverable,

not what they were (places of singing,

shining) seventeen years ago.

Is Venice still sinking? Kathmandu

is rubble. The people are old, we knew

in Cusco. And you are dead, my dear.

I’m glad to remember those cities, our cities;

and glad to be here, home, remembering
you, my journey’s companion.

At dVerse Poetics we are asked to write 12 lines including three words that mean a lot to us (mine are 'Venice', 'Kathmandu', 'Cusco') and three words describing people or things we're grateful for (mine are 'remember', 'home', 'you').