You could only survive a week at three
so I’ll assume there is little space for flowers
although it must be at least a year (not a lot
of time for longer) since I last saw you
so my guess at the height you’ll stay could
well be inaccurate. Let these cocooned buds

fall from our fingers like nursery rhymes
against your name, with more letters
than the years of your life.

When it’s just one little boy
and an unfortunate accident (despite
that sick-to-the-stomach feeling
it was a simple slip-of-the-tongue)
death and chaos march on like ugly shellfish.

Suddenly you realise that poems like this
and stanzas like this
with, again, more lines than your life had years
will never be adequate or worthy of the little boy.