Moonset
Before first light, there was something on the wall
like a pane — a presence, oblique, as if,
outside, there was a stone standing on the air,
exuding light. The full moon,
on the gloss of the painted plaster, shone
like a pale breast — lit, from within,
through the scar tissue’s rivulets,
as though it is all right to love
the idea of motherly sweetness in anything.
I put my hand into it, as if
into the side of one returned
from the dead. And out over the western river,
there she was, going over onto
the top of her head, that first spot
where air had touched her, who did not know
how not to love, or how to love.
And she upside-downed, comet with no
robe of coma trailing it,
and to the south, the seeds of some late stars
still held, dog star, throne, Orion —
the outline creature, like the young in their strollers,
smiling as if outside history,
like the tiny skeleton figure on sonogram
moving its hand through the waters, its five
fingers combing the real. And I saw it’s all
right to love the child, even if
the child were oneself — someone in me changed
sides, at dawn, without asking me. And so
goodbye, my queen, my fearsome darling,
house of horror of my heart. I do not
know how I’ll live without you, the sword of your
terrible worth. And the disc the color
of flame, doused by cream, was slowly
deposited into the earth.
