He kept them close,
in the climate-controlled vault of his heart.
We saw him receive some portions of joy,
and more of sorrows than he should bear.
Yet always his words dawdled
like messengers who turned illegible addresses
over and over in their hands.
We loved him fiercely in all events and said so,
and knew he felt the same. Yet sometimes
we waited for words like ones watching at windows
for the return from war. I wonder how
they orbited inside of him. Like mined gold
that sat heaped in carts, lacking the industry
to pull it to the surface? Winged, flustered things
that turned themselves sidelong
toward the tranquilizer guns? The years
passed and we dwelled
in the temperate valleys of his affection,
with the words perched beyond impassible mountains.
On the day he died the words spilled quickly
from a three-quarters sleep as he lay
in some dark treasury, emptying accounts.
They were precious non sequiturs,
pieces of a life deeply lived. We gathered them
scattered like wood on the hospital room floor
and vowed to keep warmth after he was gone.
