He said being dead was a little like living, only longer.

Grief might be easy if there wasn't still such beauty--would be far simpler if the silver maple didn't thrust its leaves into flame,trusting that springwill find it again.

It never ends, the bruise of being

I think it is in grief that we need some reminder of our humanity--and sometimes, someone to say it for us. Poetry steps in at those moments when ordinary words fail: poetry as ceremony, as closure to what cannot be closed.

A quiet snowglobe of pain I want to shake. While the flakes fall like ash we race the train to reach the place Emmett Till last whistled or smiled or did nothing.

The apocalypse sounds like this-- black men breaking in to steal back the thing once stole from them.

There are gods of fertility, corn, childbirth, & police brutality--this last is offered praise & sacrifice near weekly & still cannot be sated

Like grass in rain, my dead grow at an amazing rate.

Everybody wants to go to heaven but nobody wants to die to get there.