This New Body

for J.C. & W.D.

Today, soon to be gone, not gone
your body, young and newly frail,
is tired.

I see your hips, those of a man
are thinner than mine and I move
for you like your woman.

Two weeks ago you squeezed into
my shorts at the beach
and I laughed as you burst!

Even now you seem with those
wonderful eyes which love me
as a man does a woman

to be dripping with sun-water
and walking up the sand
to my arms.

Don’t fret, love, when they ask
can you carry your own weight,
try to stand.

Do you see that horizon
we had our backs to?
Now it beckons us.