Moon dance,
you were not to blame.
Nor you,
lovely white moth.
But I saw you together.
This poem is in the public domain. Published in Poem-a-Day on January 22, 2023, by the Academy of American Poets.
My friends are dead who were
the arches the pillars of my life
the structural relief when
the world gave none.
My friends who knew me as I knew them
their bodies folded into the ground or burnt to ash.
If I got on my knees
might I lift my life as a turtle carries her home?
Who if I cried out would hear me?
My friends—with whom I might have spoken of this—are gone.
Copyright © 2022 by Marie Howe. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on February 22, 2022, by the Academy of American Poets.