Glimpsed in a mirror

Names of places on an old map -

Glimpsing my younger self in a mirror - 

Gargrave, Coniston Cold -

Driving to Malham with Richard -

Shamefully, I wrote nothing -

Piecing this together from shards of memory -

The faded names - 

The half dreams - 

*

Crammed into Richard's Japanese car - 

Like innocent cosmonauts - 

Myself driving, always in the fast lane, crazy -

Not thinking for one moment about it -

*

The narrow road over the moor - 

The tall thistles in the field -

Rain falling on the roof -

Curling smoke from slim cigarettes -

The American girl from Tallahassee -

Meeting her after a shameful night -

She called me pilgrim -

Invited me after I retold a beautiful story -

Sitting cross legged on the warm grass -

A circle of boys and one girl - 

*

Now, near the high cliffs -

The lonely farms, the dark tarn 

Scrambling upwards - 

A cold wind under a northern sky - 

Ancient faces in the rocks -

Clouds - 

Far below, our cold beds -

Gareth's fiver crumpled up with a few coins -

*

Walking under the moon to The Buck Inn -

Theakstons with flint eyed farmers -

One night, fortunes told in a low ceilinged parlour -

A smoky fire, candlelight -

Geoff, refusing to open his palm -

Never saying why -

*

I thought they were young gods -

Far above me -

Nick, talking about taking rally corners in his Mini -

Gareth, with his louche drawl, his kerchief -

They knew the ways of girls -

They were cool -

Yet they were boys -

Just like me, pieces of a story -

Now gone entirely - 

Or glimpsed, sometimes, by chance, in a mirror -