First Love

Prince Adika

 

for Barbara Franklin

If I die tonight
And they ask what my last words were
Tell them I still was true
To all the first vows we made
Tell them I kept the words
I spoke amidst the ding of others' many lies
Tell them too; a tenuous twenty thousand miles
Or a flimsy four thousand days
Could never be a blurring block
To the clear perception of those first idols
We sculpted in the desk-shop of Junior Block

Tell them, will you,
The sacred moment remained intact
And I was, to the last, a priest of love
Observing all the rituals of callow seed-words

And too, let them know,
I carry the burden of our-heart-stringed-song
Across the ethereal essences of other realms
And wherever I find space,
Your name is the flag I erect.
Euphemism Campus Box 4240 Illinois State University, Normal, IL 61790-4240