Two Poems

The Burial of Jonathan Brown
1983-1985

So many memories: sun, snow, and rain,
the age-old alteration, white to green.
You do not tire of living;
things go new again.
Takers turn late to giving.

This boy's blond flame
wavers in buggy grass
or lights his shadowed room.
The baffled dog sniffs, remembers him.
What is gone,

cheating departure, stays
imprinted on your days.
You thought of him as summer growing tall.
Foreknowledge of a life
would be a dreadful gift.

April, May: earth loosens up her lap
...