Come to me vagrant, O Death:
starved of bone, starved of lung,
dime-eyed and savage.
Do not come to me gorged and gorgeous,
for it is only when you have known
true hunger, withered to a stalk,
submitted to beggary and stale breads,
you may come to my door, my table.
It will be then, O Death, that pity
becomes you - it will be there
in my clouding eyes you bear witness
to what makes grief a giving - it will be
there in my dry cracked palms held
empty before you, not a partaking of life,
but a share of a hunger assuaged and willing.