Beautiful Shrouds

Something easy, something kind. Robins hop along the stone path and I try and fail to not write that it's really their path, not mine. Is it ever a good day to be a worm? Two days without starlight, rosary beads in numbing fingers, and dreams of political troubles for which I am unprepared. Leftovers from Greek Easter, gently scrubbing dried shit and straw off this morning's eggs, laughing together at something the priest said. I am a vast cosmic blossom, a bell sinking through greening seas. The neighbor's sheep bawl, a sound I name "sorrowful" but which is really closer to "hungry." A little rain falls at six a.m. while I spade the new garden, working through the psychological complexities of women saints in nineteenth century France. She ate the dried flesh of her lips while waiting on death. Maple leaves draped across spring skies, like beautiful shrouds for people who know dying is not the end. What mercy, what justice. This banquet that never reaches my tongue, this prayer that never leaves it.