ISSUE: Fall 2018
She died & I—
In the spring of her blood. I remember
my mother’s first injury. The surprise of unborn
petals curling light, red, around her wrist.
Some fruit she cut, some onion, some
body with skin & seeds. She fed me.
She listened & I—
She held We & I—
She kept speaking with those flowers
falling from her blood, taking her
across the sky to death. I remember
her voice like a horn I never want
to pull out of my heart. In the next life,
which is here & here, I gather every thing
that ever sang my mother’s blues.
She burned & I—
She talked back hard at god.
O, she danced, unbroken, too.
Bale of grief on my back, opening
into something black I wear. A life of flesh
like a petal or fruit or burning.
I’ve carried everything & I’m tired.
She survived & I—
(But she did not live.)
She told me Nothing & I—
She was waiting the entire time.
How does the elegy believe me?
Together, we crossed the sky.
There was a gate & we walked through
the world like that.
She wrote We & I—
She was last seen & I—
Eyes, without life, opened eternity.
When the air in her
stopped & I—
She was last seen dying. She was too silent
for the first time in her life. The spring
of my mother’s blood hot & god the dark
dark beyond the closed door
that won’t move again.
