There’s no way through the grief
But to walk his gauntlet bare
Blow by blow, the purple mementos
Write the story of our affair:
The blushing bride that I have been:
The love we once shared.

There’s no way past the grief
But to lie down under his fist
To take the rage he offers
In the fury of his tryst
To nod and accept his truths
Under his smothering shroud of mist

And hope that time will heal the wounds
His knuckles here have kissed.

I wander to the river’s edge
While the current is cold as graves,
Where the wind pulls loose my hair,
There I invoke his name in staves,
I wait for him to float to me
Upon the choppy waves

I search the tidal skyline
For his toes upon the sea
For his ghostly apparition
To emerge heroically
But be he ghost or demon
The soul I adored so utterly

Will never return to me.

I loved him
With all in me that was great
And capable of love
Will sorrow dissipate?
My soldier-in-arms extinguished
By an icy wind of fate.
I search in vain.
My grief will not abate.
My Love was a lie hidden inside
My enemy’s hate.

I never got to say goodbye.
He who heard my everything in depth
My closest confidant, intimate ally,
Dissolved in breath
There is no one when I cry
To pull me to his chest.
And the world moves on, and so must I,
From the desperate bereavement of death.

Cold gray settles upon the prairie.
Winter’s approaching in endless train,
Stretching its frosted fingertips
Through the severed stalks of grain.
I hear the rumble of each freight car
And can neither embrace nor abstain,
Caught in numb paralysis
By the biting jaw of pain.
Voicelessly, I loose my lament;
The empty fields hear me complain
And lay in motionless apathy
Down every hill and lane.

I search for the warmth I’ve known,
The tender hands, but the world is not the same.

In my empty bed, I reach for him,
The husband of my many years.
I stretch my icy fingertips,
In half-sleep, I feign him here,
But the uncrushed pillow stands resolute
He will never again appear.
I wander through the coming cold
A stricken child who stumbles, veers,
Careens into each obstacle
Searching for who I once held dear
But the absence of all that once was there
Is the void that interferes.

And the precipitous coming of the cold
Threatens snow upon my tears.

I’ve awoken from the deepest dream
Night terrors left my landscape changed
I find my world, and the foundations of me,
Vandalized and rearranged

But where there’s life, there’s hope.

The friendships I made in waking sleep
Now apparitions I cannot reinhabit
But the promise stands from far away
As though etched upon some ancient tablet

And I believe from forgiven unbelief.

I feel more like myself again
The quiet girl who reads and waits
For the latter buds that sneak and bloom
Along the outer edge of the garden gate

Those late and mysterious beauties.

Though as by some raging, ruinous storm
I wake and walk through strewn debris
Detritus from a former life,
Razed remnants of the former me,

But through wild wind and heavy rain,
I find the Timeless Cornerstone unchanged.

We filled the boxes carefully
Tucking in each package tightly
Like a mother puts her brood to bed
Delicately, but spritely.

We piled the boxes high
One atop the other
Stacking rows and columns
As both support and cover.

We positioned the pallets in a line
Like worthy ships fit for their class:
A regatta with signs for sails
We bade farewell as they sailed past

Into the gales of merchantry and
I was proud of the fleet we made.
A good day’s work;
An honest trade.

We counted the stars upon our arrival
Just after the melt of the snow
Orion, Cassieopia, the milky belt, but
I could not yet know

Our love was just as distant.

The children ran to and fro
As tiny conquistadors taking a stand
Conquering acres of freedom
Taming a brave new land

Of promise and potential and hope.

We surveyed all we owned,
All we earned through toil and tears
The land was good; the promise stood
The fruit of our fruitful years

A proper nest for a bountiful brood.

But the stars burned like molten silver
Falling on us one by one
Until the land incinerated
Until all our dreams were done

And the bones of what we might have become
Lay exposed in the yard under a merciless sun.

Walking a dark night of the soul
Grooves through the grief and rejection
The indifference of my companions
Anonymity and protection
Some desire creeps in for night to take me;
We sit instead in his cold apathy
In the quiet room of winter awakening
I wait bated; he only stares back at me
Bored with my existence:
Our bond is an old one.
I have nothing left to say,
No passion to embolden.
Neither of us has the energy
To strike the other.
We sit still, numbed by chill,
Interred by the cold that covers

The graves of all seasons.

We sang amongst the lightning bugs
Slapping at the biting bugs
Like percussive beat-keepers
We watched like seekers
And rested like natives.
And if this song can be excavated
I’ll play its bones
I’ll play its bones

Upon my own.

We knew the grass by name
Knew the heat and flame
Of wild wood burning against the moon
Too wild to foresee ash consume
Our simple days
But in their graves
I’ll play their bones
I’ll play their bones

Upon my own.