A Poem

When rifling through a box of old cards this morning ,I came across a poem I wrote in June, 2009. Now I'm not one for writing poetry but the event referred to in this poem affected me profoundly and I was literally compelled to write something about it. I had to put my thoughts on paper..if only to try and understand in some way what had happened.

Basically, on a beautiful summer's evening in June, 2009 a young biker died when his bike collided with a car here in Braes on Skye. This young man was 23 and, although I did not know him personally, I remember him when he was a school boy getting on the school bus that I often travelled on too. In later years, I often saw him hanging about with other bikers in the Square in Portree. He was handsome, friendly, always smiling.. in the prime of his life. 

My eldest daughter, Natalie, phoned me and told me that he had been killed and to go look at all the messages already posted on his Bebo page. I just could not process it...that this beautiful summer's evening had been this boy's last and his friends were now expressing and sharing their sense of shock and sadness at his loss in the most immediate and accessible way they knew.

Anyway... here is the poem which I had just scribbled down on a bit of paper...at least by typing it here I can acutally save it somewhere relatively safe.

Last Active

'Last active' 12hrs

Online status given damning power

As speeding death overtook at Braes

RIPs like the blood slick seep down his page.

Where friends pour out youth's soft pain

And he 'last active' forever will remain.