Unconcerned with words slipping under tongues, I dream
Of faulty fables that take a silent turn. We all wonder,
Don’t we? Where is the beauty we cannot see? The rain,
A faithful beat of steeping loss that sways our heads. The stars,
A heap of broken light deserting the sky to preach in our eyes.
The wind that shares freshening warmth under a sunny sky,
It grazes every day, yet only the day remembers. Something
Is incredibly right, so deeply flawed and whimsical in our minds.
Forgetting, but stopping to remember a lyrical light. As a child
I closed my eyes to pray on the edge of my bed, ‘Oh God,
I know you can hear me. Please, make me feel happy,’ and I still pray
Today, on the edge of my bed

With no pajamas, no hopes and few regrets. ‘Oh god, you are not there,
I know. I am clumsy to bother your empty throne but I must send this request:
Please, God, protect the fear, protect the loss, protect the helpless hope
Splintering our hearts. Try to forget I have stopped believing. I will try
To believe.’

Leave me, leave me! Your questions will disrupt my weep and this is all
I can do. This is all I can think: whispering thoughts beyond all my hopes,
All my dreams. But you must not leave me more than a minute. Soon
All tears will be crust on my skin, all prayers will seize me, all darkness
Will hush me and all but a candle will burn. And you must be by me.

When did the moon stop singing? When did the stars start disappearing?
An answer is all I can fear. The stars have not yet disappeared. And no one is here;
I am whispering to my own ear, but a memory of a heap of starlit faces
Bow down, and hold my empty hand, and carry me, lovingly, till the end
Of the night.