Sepia Spring

1.  Birth, Death, Explosion, and Rebirth

	The cosmic cycle of birth, death, explosion, and rebirth has not been going on forever.
	—Lyman Spitzer, Jr.  Searching Between the Stars

How, then, did it begin?
I’ve been studying black holes, contraction,
dark matter. It’s June, and everything is sun;
I dwell on swallowing, and miss you more
than ever. I need light. Expansion.
Already there is too much dark, long before
the equinox. I’ve ripped down my curtains.

I had to rearrange my bookshelves yesterday.
Marty opened your office, told us to take
what we wanted. I felt like a thief,
a peeping-tom looking through your windows,
wanting to touch you. There were only loops, 
susiesusiesusiesusiesusie to run beneath my fingers.

I didn’t know you loved the stars. I should have known.
I read the entire preface and pages one, two,
three before I find you—you and someone else,
or maybe two of you—a scrap of you—
deux billets du metro.

2.  Penciled Notes:  Christina Rosetti’s “Song” 

	“Death as oblivion,” Fall, 1994.

You must have known.
You underlined every word.

3.  Neither Flowers

Nearly a year now, January. Nearly
a year, and the sidewalks are covered
in death, pink petals,

camellias who believed spring’s lies.
Their brown sisters welcome them
pitiless, gently cackling

beneath their honeyed blush. Heart
shaped buds still reach for sun, warm
breath in winter’s lungs.

This one, its insides moonstone—and
June will not come for months—browns
before it leaves the branch.

What shades will death bring? Pale sepias.
Dirty pinks that bloom on skin like bruises,
and the sky still gray.

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