Calliope. For Amy Winehouse

Sirius sizzled through the London fog
on the night you were born. Mount Olympus
blew and the sky bellowed
as the grey world shuddered awake
birthing an eclipse:
A lighthouse for the lost,
a nightingale illuminating winter
with blue shade.

Twenty-seven years later; moon spilling
in through the burnt orange twilight
I saw your face in my dream.
Your lashes of black fire and scarlet lips
marching an army of broken hearts
into bliss.

Narcotic, we shuffled through the Camden delta
to your house, soaked the wine in soul
and drank until we were laughed at
by the Gods.

Sometimes I think about that night;
I turn on the radio and you
swim in my eyes once more.

Gary Akroyde

.