ODE TO NE

Matt Kam (2023)

Nigel, you are the heart and soul, the Handsome Prince of all things beautiful, all things quintessentially Divine.

We see you when we see the Greenman sculpted onto that archway;
We hear you when we hear the creaky Tudor beams;
We understand you like the way we understand the Latin spelling of the year that building was erected, etched above the doorway.

We delight in you like the way we take delight in the early Spring snowdrops and crocuses eventually giving way to the York April daffodils, the Tête-à-Tête popping up from the Azul glazed ceramic pot in good time, the homemade jar of marmalade.

We feel safe like the way Pearl and Manuka pur when they are stroked by you.

We smell you when the summer winds are adorned with the impermanent perfume of Gorse, or when we catch a glimpse of 4711 in the cool evening mist, or in the old musty second hand bookshop with leather bound books and gold leaf edges.

We hear you when we hear the Silent upbows of the string section before the conductor's decisive gesture marking downbeat for tutti, the sustained dying harmony conjuring wonderment in that opening of Les collines d'anacapri, the distant whistling of the steam engine in Tywyn railways, the bells at Salisbury Cathedral.

Till we meet and reunite again in your New Home, we will feel and will know your permanent and undying love; inside and out, above and beneath, around and everywhere, always and forever.