Grave

Trees grow thick; heavy they and tattered in leaves are dragged to earth, where they rot. Rocks were hardened before. There was time. Invisible, it was set. There was silicon and land. Water if blood as a stone pressed would cry. Earth is old. Love, a mountain, pushed up greening, in the rain, pushed up as in me a seed buried under a rock, was bent yellow, as it was set hard. And love is just a mountain. I walked away. Love, as for her, she was heavy. As for all I hold in me, or held away. She is dead, I said, smiling the callous hand, a strong grip on it.

January 1972