First Date

Come to dinner
she said.
Bring a fork.
(Who invites someone to dinner
and can't provide a fork?)

Forty-three years later
this memory slides through.
From all the life scenes
locked in her head
why this one?
Why now?

I want you to remember
he says from the grave
as if that cancels out
the years that followed.
Still ...
it makes her smile to recall
that first October dinner
when he had to bring
his own fork.

-- Annie Wyndham