elegy to a departed saint

Ode to David Bowie
Judy Gamboa, January 11, 2016

Brushing droll hair back from pink lids, waking from slumber, 

transported in a squeaky jalopy to my youth in California

when David Bowie was my boyfriend. 

On a vapid night of orange summer, we were on the lam -

we screamed away on his motorbike, 

on the run and love-mad.

Kooks and bitches chased us through the broken city,

careening down the vacant roads, trailing behind us gilt confetti. 

Gray metropolis faded to sweetly opened green

as the dawn presented a lush pastoral scene

we tucked ourselves away in the cathedral of a dusty barn

and there found refuge in the golden hay

wrapped in his leather I awoke to a bluebird’s strident song

and cried in my pillow -

my hero was gone.