ELEGY TO BE EXHALED AT DUSK

I am an elegy to be exhaled at dusk. I am an elegy to be written on a late

October leaf. An elegy to be blown

from its tree by a late October wind. To be stomped on & through

by passersby old & young

& dead & unborn. To be crinkled & crushed into tiny brown-

orange pieces. & then

collected, painstakingly, no, painfully, piece by piece, & assembled like

a puzzle or collage or

Egyptian god, but always incomplete, always a few bits & limbs

missing. An elegy to be

misplaced, stuffed away in the attic’s memory, & only brought out again

once every occupant of the house has

ceased. Yes, I am an elegy properly architectured by ruin. An elegy that has

experienced crows & lake effect

snow, an elegy that has seen Ukrainian snow falling on the forehead

of Paul Celan, Paul Celan’s mother,

the German tongue, the tangled tongues of all your literary

& literal ancestors—but more

than that, an elegy that has felt light, the early morning light falling

on your lovely someone’s

lovable bare feet as he walks across the wood floor to sit by the window,

by the plants, with a cup of jasmine

& a book he will barely open but love to hold the weight of

in his lap. I am,

my friend, an elegy that has taken into account, into heart & October wind,

the weight of someone’s soft

hair-covered head in someone else’s warm, welcoming lap.