At first absence did not rush in.
Its brevity was a pause,
a cancellation, a sudden clearing
past the moss beds under the pines.
No more strolls through the old woods,
the same muddy tracks, same old stream.
Of course it was a lull, a blackout:
forgetting makes sleep the salve it is.
I woke to that inky, bottomless hush
that stamps afternoons when you’ve missed
a morning or can’t wait for night to end.
Other mourners want a story stitched up
and ready, they want the next song to play,
they want to shop and love each other.
They want the untrained eye
to forgive the disappearing snow
where that patch of grasslessness
welcomes back the wrens and juncos.
Who can bear those voices, all that singing?