#153

“The great slumber”
they call it
as though
this
is real
and what’s to come
is the dream

#144

No, he said
I don’t fly
in my dreams
any longer.
I only tend
to the garden-
She always loved
flowers

There’s no room
in life
to save for
the dead,
but I thought
she might come
to my dreams
instead

#139

Like
raindrops
racing

to a
hard
concrete

end,
you have
only

so much
time
between

heaven
and death
to see

the
world in
between

#128

Do not carve my name in concrete,
for what can it mean when I’ve ceased to breathe?
Called before I was born, my name rang true
but reborn in death, I am called anew
Do not scrawl me into relativity –
daughter, sister, relations fade
by era to anonymity.
Do not chip away at numbers,
dates of life and death
A thousand years one day to Him,
What could matter less?
No, simply assure me
As you return me
To the arms of my master
That I was what mattered:
Seven letters from an eternal trumpet
Simply write on my headstone beloved

#114

Cause of death:
For all she knows,
it may as well say drowning
She has suffered
Hand in hand with
Wave on wave of
Water breaking
Tearful breaking
Surface of the water
Breaking
She is all that’s left, and far from
Whole
She is dehydrated
But pour from ceramic vases and
She leaks

#87

Blackbird song
In January, balanced
On concrete the way Earth
Clings
To winter snow as gravity
Tries to spin us into
Spring but
Blackbird songs
Balance on concrete the way
Veiled hats and long black silk
Perch
With death-defying grace where
Sacrament and sacrifice
Converge
And blackbirds sing
In January, while their
Audience tries to
Balance
Unsteady footing, broken ground
Standing alone without
Silence