For Robert Osborne, Monarch Of Movies Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

for Robert Osborne, In Memorium d. march 6,2017

dreaming my dream as if it were an old movie
in sepia tones or the interiors with the luxuriant
contrasts

in a vast house of lamps with little prisms
ornate mirrors, and corridors of snow
or sunlit orchid paths or a lone hill

where the riders ride away.
the riders ride away.
it is sunset in techicolour

oh stay cry the summers from the page
turned into films that we watch over and over
but there is no delay

the old clocks tick and the cherry branches
and the axe is at hand,
the orchard stilled.

gone is the familiar presence
and the rider on the hill.

mary angela douglas 20 march 2017