Charles Bonnet Syndrome
I see the garden erupt in an Edwardian funeral,
I see nodding leilandii boil
into a plumed-horse procession,
fuchsia a parade of red-cassocked priests.
I see the window and street beyond, contract
with macular degeneration.
The unrecognised visitors are
sudden, they change suddenly.
Tear streaked children descent
and ascent the stairs, robed in blue and rose,
but they do not accuse me, or humiliate me,
jeer or seek to seduce me.
In the garden I breathe the gasp of last year's leaves
I find a handkerchief in mid-air
as the afternoon pours itself
through a thousand gutters and down-pipes
a sky-coloured handkerchief, spotted orange.
I understand dementia's brother has crept into my optical tract,
while memory fills the dark with fantasy patterns:
a man walks toward me, smiling:
he wears a dressing gown, he needs a shave;
a man of similar demeanour to how I might appear,
if reflected in a window against a darkening afternoon.
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