Far below, plowed fields vibrated
in the spring heat like black harps.
But all that was behind him now:
the lakes and swamps, the low places,
the lilacs with their heart-shaped
leaves shading the clustered huts.
He turned to the windy cliffs
and pathless slopes above the tree line
where each boulder gave forth
its single, inconsolable note.
Who knows? Maybe it would be simpler.
When she was alive, her body
confused him; he couldn’t think
clearly when she was close. Scent
of her skin made him dizzy.
Now, where she had been: only
a gaping hole in air,
an emptiness he could fill with song.