Raglan Road Or Near Enough

Raglan Road or Near Enough
I always meant to write a song for youon Raglan Road. Then winter came, with its longjohns and bold cats and forty proof. I entertainedalmost unidentifiable feelings in the basement’sblackout. It would have been better if I had leftsome feelings unidentified, but that was nevermy style, or rather lack of it: everybody knowsI’ve got no game. Anyhow, if I did, what wouldwe ever laugh about? I don’t believe everyoneloves a winner, but I do believe we all crackup sooner or later for a dirty joke, a groaner —everyone loves a class clown, at least once,at least briefly, because everyone loves a punchlineor a punching bag; everyone’s punch-drunk, one time.On Raglan Road, your hair started to go grey,I want to say prematurely, except we weren’tso young. Mature is a polite word for it; but youmight say we skipped that part, headed straightto rotten. I skulked around those mold-drownedrooms in your rotten longjohns and felt a lovefor you so perfect it was indistinguishable frommourning. My love was so much more impeccablethan any human man, you may as well have died.One imagines how it felt, in the crosshairs.
I missed you, daily, in plain sight, on RaglanRoad with the lost leaves of January shudderingabove your head in its permanent cowl of smoke,and the unimpeachable soprano winter light siftingthrough the wind’s tin whistle, and the holes in yoursocks, and in your shoes, and in that thing I called oh myheart. The sky was a series of holes closely wovenas a sieve. I saw you straining through the winter’s poresinto piebald tomorrow, halfdead with the life of it,and your greys like the fuzz on stale bread or abutterfly’s wing, your woolen foureyed glareall bergamot and black ice and brandy exhale,and the smell of the numb, simmering earth and yourcoat coated in cedar dust undusted and your safflowerskin, and I could see myself, as if from a treebranchor a crow’s nest or a copcar peeling paston Raglan Road or near enough, at the edge of theframe whistling “Raglan Road” out of key, fading.                                                                                                                                                    -Eva H.D.Raglan road or Near Enough first appeared in Typishly. Reprinted here with author's permission.
E H.D. possibly referencing P. Kavanagh's Raglan Road.