_69. Upon Reading a Letter of Loss (2)

For Sergei

We save ourselves with the written word.
We say, it must be recorded
because the featureless waters of silence
lack holiness when death still fills them.
Because speech is the best outlet
for an unpronounceable grief,
but reminds us how impermanent
our disturbances on the world are.
Because we see no other option.
Because it absolutely happened.

It’s been raining all day.
Of course it’s been raining all day.
But when we are pulled
from the bodies we inhabit
by dumb reality we need to touch
the cold, wet outdoors.
We need to enter the world
on its own terms and temperatures,
embrace its undeniable water.
Embrace knowing that what we are made of
might also drown us.
It’s been raining all day but
in a green patch in the park
the world is still full of miracles
as well as deliberate misfortune,
and I know only that I need to write it all down.
To keep my hand holding a storied world
and commemorate the live memory of existence.