First words, last words

for Robert Adamson, 1943–2022

First words, last words—

mostly they’re inaudible,

like the mimicry of bowerbirds

or a radio through cotton wool

with fuzz around the frequency.

You guess at what the words might be

but no guess seems quite plausible.

First words, last words,

the open mouth might hold a place

to fill whenever time affords

a waking dream, or some such phrase,

or feathers found inside a book

of Shelley that you turned and shook

until they molted to the floor.

In piles of catalogs you find

the dead leave everything behind.

First word, last word,

more cry than word, more wheeze than cry:

through fuzz and cotton wool you heard

no last hello or first good-bye,

but muttering that might have been

today, berley, yes, or spin;

such whispers don’t quite signify.

First word, last word,

they sound both civilized and wild,

part human and part bowerbird,

the parts as yet unreconciled.

You keep awake as daylight fails

beside a crib or bed with rails—

first as parent, then as child—

and listen for a sign of death,

each breath in slow pursuit of breath.

Devin Johnston