Conclusively

The night was almost too long to bear.
Then there was evidence of mercy—a passing car—
milky air—and I could see
dry walls & gravel on the way to a highway
Atlantic for its grays.

Loss is the fulfillment of the Law.
Space collected on a long line.

I was eliminated as a locus of mothering—
a she—physical but imaginary as a restless daughter.

Why this body and not another?

The one who came to destroy the works of women—
their offspring—
knew how many people were resisting incarnation.
He counted them by accommodating them.

Guilt-relieving guilt
is the get of killers whose mouths shine.
I can't say enough about this—red because sore
& polished because wet.

One died to become the spirit-guide.
Before that time
there were second persons in everything.
Then saints, then no one
to guide anyone to heaven.
Cosmic expansion has gone in its preferred direction.

I can hear the hour, this never
happened to me before.
One day I will shake the blue sky from my hair
and slip back to consciousness—
the thing that is always aware
with or without a living creature to share its pleasures.

Tonight I request the precious gift of final perseverance
shored up in my sheets near Route 57—
not far from a predawn holocaust
of traveling children.