First Edit - Bands

[Farkas]

We are awkward with one another;
thirty years and yet we sit in silence,
the clock’s ticking grows increasingly loud.
Our story a hymn of love and of loss
sung in equal measure.

Our private turns of tragedy,
of sadness and rigid regrets
separate yet bind us, yoked as we are
to this life, and to each other
like dead and green leaves.

I rise to gather plates.

The geese are out this morning,
their hoarse honking, tenor tubas
in the marching band. They waddle
clockwise around the lake like so much brass,
wearing matching hats and boots.

Suddenly, as if at sharp lift
of an absent conductor’s baton,
proving they have practiced enough,
they rise up,
flying in perfect formation.

Hi

Bands - A subdivision of a people that has a relatively simple social structure having the same ideas or beliefs or who are pursuing the same activity together.

These two bands do not meet the definition of the title. I believe the intended contrast is a poetic tool sharply bringing in focus a tragic loss.

The meaning of life is to continue. The loss of genetic code is death. What remains is the waiting.