2007/01/23
2007/01/22
2007/01/18
your father's death
Not in a hood,
as a skull,
as an ovoid blackness,
the angel of death
wanders through my night
but as a plump, ordinary woman
midsixties, motherly,
quiet, comfortable,
practical-shoed pace,
smiling, unremarkable,
short-haired, grandmotherly,
not designed to preside
over businesses and corporations
but over the small particularities
of the last breath.
And she tells me without words
she does double duty
as the angel of life
presiding over the small particulars
of birth, of the first breath.
She watches
settling her rounded plainness down,
as your father rises this dawn
from his bed, disconnected,
and stands
tall, magnificent, frail,
with elegant, large eyes
and looks his blessing and praise
upon each of you
one by one
.
She is as quietly pleased
with her work
as a cook
to whose sweet bowl we return
to lick our fingers
again and again.
as a skull,
as an ovoid blackness,
the angel of death
wanders through my night
but as a plump, ordinary woman
midsixties, motherly,
quiet, comfortable,
practical-shoed pace,
smiling, unremarkable,
short-haired, grandmotherly,
not designed to preside
over businesses and corporations
but over the small particularities
of the last breath.
And she tells me without words
she does double duty
as the angel of life
presiding over the small particulars
of birth, of the first breath.
She watches
settling her rounded plainness down,
as your father rises this dawn
from his bed, disconnected,
and stands
tall, magnificent, frail,
with elegant, large eyes
and looks his blessing and praise
upon each of you
one by one
.
She is as quietly pleased
with her work
as a cook
to whose sweet bowl we return
to lick our fingers
again and again.
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