of all my stuff. I could not hold it, drinking
it, yet winking
at its coming.
How could I see it is like a lined leaf,
fur-lined and limned with wrinkles even more
blown through my door
in the mind's grief?
And yet I knew the winter night was sinking
on winds that fell, and what they sigh or sing
is no live thing
to human thinking.
I send sprays
to you
of the tear-new springtime
lime-wet fog-rime
I send days
to you.
I send hours
to you
hard-fingered, dark-lined,
glow-burned, mind-mined
in care of craft
I send ours
to you.
I send these
to you:
Donne-work, Yeats-youth,
Blake-eyes, Hopkins-tooth,
brush-stroke and axe-haft
I send keys
to you.
I send no more
to you.
Cold looks, closed gates,
full houses, questioning fates
sing where we laughed,
I send the score
to you.
the cold epidemic
— remembering a therapist friend who
