The last night of my 20s
The last night of my 20s - Kayo Chingonyi
The last night of my 20s
For Roddy Lumsden
Fitting that the day should dawn
in this most Lumsdenesque of Lumsdenesque
contexts: sea-froth for night music
and the company of Suzannah –
kind enough to show me this walk
she knows without recourse to light.
When the hour came
‘Mr Brightside’ played it in
a song to which
by dint of the glint
in Sophie Barnard’s eye
twelve years ago
I cannot listen passively.
Which calls to mind the secret canticle
that undoes you, Roderick.
Maybe it is better some things
retain their mist
that all of us might carry a well of myth
in the pit of our pitch,
maybe it is by such melodies we exist.
from A Blood Condition (Chatto & Windus, 2021), © Kayo Chingonyi 2021, used by permission of the author and the publisher.