Mozart laughing,
the earth turns,
an old gramophone,
music–hear its trill. It’s a cuckoo. Now stop.
The violin pleads with roses,
cello kindnesses, droplets in a silver bowl,
floating music
without words. Bring words
to this morning euphoria,
to wellbeing, living when others die
when others suffer. Suffering
counts vertebrae, encircles the scapula,
needs no help.
And those who suffer endure, are compassion’s witness:
Old men holding fear,
hidden in cartons, the homeless,
and Sofia leaves wards
cradling empty buntings pink-
warm against heavy breasts.
How kind that the living believe
the dead to be resting
or that more may be possible.
For the living, the work of living consumes the living.