12
Is there a secret in the flowers?
When we began, your hair, now black, was blonde.
You talked about the desire for knowledge.
You talked about it endlessly.
You looked up the name of the flower in a dictionary.
13
Is there a secret in the cemetery?
Yellow leaves fell in it
and floated automatically into piles. You were drinking water
from an opaque bottle with an image of a pink flower.
You always, it seemed, had the bottle with you.
14
Is there a secret in clouds?
Wind lifted your silver and blonde hair. August clouds negotiated the day,
which was a dream. A line of black cars passed through the gate
and curved pavement of the cemetery. Headlights shedding little light.
You took a flower from a pile of loose ones, looked directly
in my eyes as though you remembered me.
15
Little light is the problem.
Birds chip at silence. A brick loosens.
Music of the leftover forest
sweeps over us,
a shadow pulling us down.
Music sweeps over
like a garden sprinkler.
Little God is the problem.
It is morning.
There is a book somewhere
that cranks sadness
up a notch,
where it turns into nostalgia.
There must be.
There must be a time,
drizzled with light,
one would want to return to.