the process of leaning through sorrow

Everyone misses someone they've never met
and don't even like "in that way."

We know what it means to be touched
and to have invited that touching beforehand

To hold words on our rolling tongues
and cradle the fall air like marbles in our pockets.

We're all nestled cheek to jowl like clusters of black jewels
where each knows winter is upon us.

We're feeling the dark like a fresh death,

living outside time
waking at six o clock every morning,
ignoring strange clusters of pomegranate seeds
ignoring the burr of distraction.

We want to write a hymn
to the dawn that doesn't sound like one,
a hymn that is based on a tender moment
with an Alaskan boy

who gets to live in sunlight for 90 days
and in stars for 100