NEVER SO ALONE AS HERE
(in memory of my mother Ita)

a night
scattered with stars
each star so clear

in its perfect
isolation
you feel as if you are

about to pluck it
from its position
examine it

put it
exactly
back

watch as time & the world
come apart
(watch as neither match)  

each minute
like a bead of prayer
fumbled through fingers

in its litany of despair
a rosary of
hopelessness

the back of her hand
resting in the palm of mine
stupidly the thought

crossing my mind
“She made
this hand...”

and now she searches
for her dying
sees it reflected

in our faces

our grief her mirror
each star
a tear

in the perfection
of its isolation
never so alone


as here as now
the Milky Way
spilt across the sky