More on: Poetry

The guards can never leave the House of Correction because they work there but I can leave quick as I can dream. I close my eyes and hear singing again.

I could never have abandoned you if I hadn’t abandoned myself.

What He Knew _____ for David :: Before Alzheimer’s and during it when he spoke in stray words or in sounds he sometimes moved his hands like birds _____ in flight… so that, watching his hands punctuate the air I’d ask myself Am I watching birds disappear? Or a flower, opening?   :: “If we…

I give you my thanks. Perhaps
you see that in my eyes, although
the only words I have left
are no doubt cruel.

mother
tongue she was used to holding, now she uses it to say
the things she means, what God has shown her

To be a priest
is to widen your arms
to hold the great sorrow

I wrap you in a cape and snug it with a clip.
How careful I must be, rounding
your good ear with scissors, the ear
my tongue loves to kiss, apricot-sweet,
and loves, too, the bad ear and its ghosts.

Did you put him
on the canvas to get one more Jew out
of harm’s way?

First we cry.
Then the tears turn to stone.
Then we remember just one thing:
The death of a son.

The nurses took off the sterile white net,
tied your hair back from your beautiful face,
and detached the machines to let you die.