Old Friends

          Old friends

          Old friends

          Sat on their park bench like bookends

          The newspaper blown through the grass

          Falls on the round toes

          Of the high shoes

          Of the old friends

          What did I do to deserve this?  It's got to be the hundredth time I've asked myself, but I still don't know.  I've had my share of hard times in the past, but most of them were just petty things that a teenage boy would worry about; none of them would last.  Except for the bite- but I got used to that… that was okay, with James and Sirius and Peter.

          And now they're gone now.  All of them.  James, a victim of his love and evil- Sirius, prey to his heartless cousin- and Peter, well, he's as good as dead.  There's no hope for him now.

          When I was fifteen, when they first became Animagi, for the first time in my life, I had hope, and it was the best feeling in the world.  How naïve I was then- I didn't realize that all the good things I knew would eventually crumble around me.  At that time, I really could see us, at sixty or seventy, even- sitting in the Three Broomsticks like we did back when we were in school, drinking butterbeers, laughing over the latest Ministry mishap.  Just four old men lost in our own world, without a care to save us.

          Old friends

          Winter companions, the old men

          Lost in their overcoats, waiting for the sun

          If I can close my eyes, I can still see us sitting on the lawn at Hogwarts.  I can still hear James boasting about Quidditch, Sirius thinking up our next prank, Peter cheering them wildly on, and me… me sitting there, watching it all, like the standby I've always been.  That I always will be.

          A reserve friend… did my actions perceive me as a traitor, as Sirius thought I was?  An untrustworthy wolf, perhaps?  No.  I never would have betrayed them.  Sirius, James, Peter- they were my life, for a while.  I thought they cared about me.  And I shouldn't have been an observer all that time.  I could have paid more attention to Peter, encouraged him, maybe that was all he needed.  But I had to be good, silent Remus.  Because I thought that was cool.  But my friends loved me for that.

          The sounds of the city

          Sifting through trees

          Settle like dust

          On the shoulders

          Of the old friends

          My memories of that time and that naivety will never die.  The seventies, the calm before the storm, will forever remain influential in wizarding history.  Maybe Harry's children will look back on it someday, and remember me.  Remember the days before the Weird Sisters, when the Patroni ran the game.  The days before Exploding Snap and Gobstones, when you could buy a set of Conniving Cards for three Knuts.  The days when fools fell in love.

          Can you imagine us years from today?

          Sharing a park bench quietly

          How terribly strange to be seventy

          Yes, yes, how terribly strange to be seventy.  According to us, we'd stay young forever.  We could play tricks on Snape and lounge around drinking pumpkin juice until the end of time.

          We were wrong.  But memories- some of them don't fade.

          Old friends

          Memory brushes the same years

          Silently sharing the same fears

          Time it was, and what a time it was

          It was-

          A time of innocence

          A time of confidences

          Long ago, it must be

          I had a photograph

          Preserve your memories

          They're all that's left you