THE TALLY

5 7 R T H E T A L L Y R O B E R T B . S H A W Mother first, now my wife. Dead within a year. A joke unfunny life has foisted on me here. Past sixty, orphanhood can’t be unexpected. It came: I understood. Grief was calm, collected. But that just months ahead there would be a second farewell to be said – that I had not reckoned. One, two: each blow hit home. Each left the house more quiet. Each time, the patient loam obtained some profit by it. The orchestra has stopped. But faintly, unabating though the baton has dropped, two notes go on vibrating. One, two: insistent pair clinging to every thought. Murmured to vacant air, ‘‘One, two’’ adds up to nought. 5 8 Y One, two: my footsteps roam from empty street to street. Some tireless metronome sets the relentless beat. One, two: the pace I keep requires no grace of art. Whether I wake or sleep, despoiled again, my heart does all it knows to do: as if it overheard, it keeps the count – one, two – will, till I make a third. ...