“
This book, this page, this harebell laid to rest
Between these sheets, these leaves, if pressed
still bleeds
a watercolour of the way we were.
Those years: the fuss of such and such a day,
that disagreement and its final word,
your inventory of names and dates and times,
my infantries of tall, dark, handsome lies.
A decade on, now we astound ourselves;
still two, still twinned but doubled now with love
and for a single night apart, alone,
how sure we are, each of the other half.
This harebell holds its own. Let’s give it now
in air, with light, the chance to fade, to fold.
Here, take it from my hand. Now, let it go.
— In Our Tenth Year by Simon Armitage