One day in July

Terrorists bombed three trains and burst a bus

A week before Jim's garden BBQ.

The sun bounced off cracked concrete, bathing us

In brittle jocularity. Then you

Insulted Jim's friend - something gauche you said -

And I felt glad we merely shared a flat.

But on the hot bus home, I stroked your head.

You held my hand. We kissed. And that was that.

That summer shone, for, rapt in love's embrace

I'd realised, I think, that people die.

And so I live each time I lift my face

To kiss you, blue behind your head, the sky.

We love for love is living, you and I;

We began that fifteenth of July.