Burial
A path can always be drawn: I see it
beyond the fallen pine. A row of cedar
just above a broken knee of land. Winter
topples around me: a finger snap, moan,
binge-drinking moon. From a distance,
the hours arriving home approach detritus
and I’m laughing at the loss, pinching myself
in a dream. Chewed sinew of hinterland, crushed
ash of bone. You’ll be forgotten. The bruised shore
sips the lakes that keep it from thawing. This life
is one of them: memory, falling asleep alone
in a snow tunnel. Huddled to the wall, perfectly
warm. Shaded from cold, they saw I was missing—
gone, removed, malignant. That could be now
except for only familiar regret, the snap of tinder
and waiting: what if the snow buckled in? It takes
a step to make a footprint, a trail already laid.
The cardinals gawk at me, lean on sun-ridden
sky…
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