A friend from the past remembers our bond
as a halcyon time of good will:

she loving the pot roast dinners I made,
I craving her homemade hot fudge.
The two of us driving to Sarasota
where I won the first prize for memoir,
or searching the cinema car park at midnight
for my unfindable car.
Later, singing Ubuntu at church.

The same memories tarnished for me
by her demands on my time,
sudden snappish critiques,
draconian standards for friendship:
all reminiscent of unhappy marriage.

Which brings to mind the story of Alcyone,
daughter of Aeolus, god of the winds,
who exults that her happy marriage to Ceyx
rivals the bliss of the gods—
an offense for which they transform her
into a kingfisher bird,
though garnished with feathers so brilliant
they seem, as she dives,
to be pulling ribbons of fire behind
like the flames of a Maori tattoo.

So too was my old friendship altered,
in both her memory and mine,
by what our assumptions decreed.
Begun in elation and ending in woe
no less fiery than Alcyone’s feathers,
no more or less questionable
than the whims of the gods.
My recollections of it darkened by angst,
hers recast as our halcyon days.

Sharon Whitehill is a retired English professor from West Michigan now living in Port Charlotte, Florida. In addition to poems published in various literary magazines, her publications include two scholarly biographies, two memoirs, two poetry chapbooks, and a full collection of poems. Her chapbook, THIS SAD AND TENDER TIME, is due out winter 2024.