Five years

Wind back five years
(that’s all we’ve got)
this day, two friends left
walked together, perhaps, who knows
through the coloured light
leaving this world a little darker
a little quieter a little emptier.

The sky will be fierce clear tonight
and amid star-dazzle
and serious moonlight
we’ll tell ourselves we see
our big beautiful Branwell
stretching across the universe
to the Starman on the other side.

 

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We had five years left to cry in

We had five years left to cry in,

Before the ice poured on our heads,

And winter lasted a lifetime,

The oceans heaved out of their beds.

 

They said Earth was really dying,

We had five years left to cry in,

I held your face and kissed your lips,

Too little time, love’s assassin.

 

A life condensed to the basics,

Lived in stark black or snowy white,

We had five years left to cry in,

Or we could fill the time with light.

 

Love, hands held, the last songs singing,

Last breath, but beauties still begin,

A perfumed petal filled with dew,

We had five years left to cry in.