of joy is in its trusted end
today I walk home and the sun lows itself beneath the white earth
a bird chirps in the solemn tree
the tragedy is in the knowing, in that
the brown-winged bird will migrate down and never come back—in that
the song will end
I see in your face but an instant unmeasured joy
and also,
that bird will die
and we will always say goodbye

our love (in held hands, in
enraptured dance),
like lost language dies—
the letters, rose in my cupboard
Polaroid I’ll keep (of you yesterday)
of interim element
belonging to the earth, and so do you

and I—
will imagine you approaching me
one day when you’re not here

today I will not have to imagine the laughing eyes, the curve of the nose, the cheek against my face, your whisper to me that your love is mine
today and always and always and always
today my fingers touch yours, and I trust
with baited breath
in unpromised tomorrow.

(and like a fool replay the
song
for a chance that we exist beyond
the refrain)