Comfort, give comfort to my people, says your God….
—Isaiah 40:1-5

Until the day falls there is nothing
I can say, my friend. Until
the mountain kneels. He suffered
so long in wordless suffering, a pain

without wounds. May your brother,
who belongs now to remember,
be restored to light as wood is
by ember. Whatever relief it brings.

Restore him, Unthinkable, before
the voices roiled his head. Before wind
-shield genuflected before
his trouble-lovely face. Before night

broke like a window, & blackness
spread. Unspeakable, restore us,
we who belong to nothing
that will not cease, to nothing

that will. Until the day falls,
my friend, nothing I can say
will bring this dark to heel.
Until the mountain kneels.