"Still Life With Lost Cosmonaut" - John Burnside

If I imagine you dead, there is no love
immense enough to bring you back to earth;
but here, in this bowl of apples, on this kitchen
table, gold
and crimson in a space
that could not be more ample or precise
I see you drifting in the selfsame light
that I inhabit, wishing not
to occupy, or slip loose, or possess,
life being more to me than I could ever
wish for, colour, shape, the subtleties
of shade, and when I bite into the fruit,
the taste of it, much more than I could
wish for; though I wish you could be here.

John Burnside. Still Life With Feeding Snake. London: Jonathan Cape, 2017.