
Vermont, Early Spring
In April snow lingers like a drought.
[S]omeone I can’t dream has left this body
I frame you like a museumed artifact, safe from thievery and me.
Dear broken bread.
Dear broken skull.
Dear Thanksgiving.
[T]ell them, dear child, of the female narrative not born
of temptation & sin but of the blood of your blood singing out.
But real sickness arrived like an invitation
slipped under the door
You’re tempted to find God in every abandoned landscape:
twist of black road snaking through dry grass, shroud
of white hotel cotton, blank heaven that cannot conjure
cloud.
Generations are contained
in her wrist bones, in whether she can
constrain the nature of the bird.
No crying in broad daylight on the street,
child warm and sweet in your arms.
There are no eyes in this poem. Not your eyes
judging your child. Not his eyes, not looking at you.