Refrain adapted from a remembered line in Louise Erdrich’s The Bingo Palace
Hardly a day goes by she doesn’t pause at a window, or on slick-end streets
recalling seasons of lilac in scented waves rolling or woodsmoke or sleet
first were the hours, days, weeks, then years she wondered
what becomes of the question: “what became of us?”, fable and future
all mixed up in never was or could be, the bell struck once, a wind
rushed through most things not meant to last, but still
Her love was a burning letter, comet streak across the sky
At a table with the Berkshires in the background, summer birds make a racket
part the morning fog, leave her once again holding her porcupine heart
there are books and sisters, music being made, her painted chairs and porches
and she’ll walk in the square, find her feet on the sidewalk, friends by
the fountain, and the little white evening lights, sparkle against sadness
there are faces in the trees, sleepers under bridges, many ways home
Her love was a burning letter, comet streak across the sky
Years pass and she wonders what becomes of old sorrows, bodies
untouched in the places they hunger, she has food on the table,
her children at play, and a great many questions have floated away
but the feathered moon rises full fat in the sky or a song on the
radio crashes her mind and her words become jumbled a shadow
descends on the now that is now, and the memory of then.
Her love was a burning letter, comet streak across the sky
Early Morning Poems 