September

Noon's slow hemorrhage
into sundown.

These brief rays
chilled, cloaked
in grey.

Sorrow
is not its first name -

shame colors
the jerk of chains, air
wounded by shouts, wails.

Everything is broken, here -

dry eyes, distances bridged
by consoling hands.

Warm ghosts bargain, here,
for their memories,
for a loss that is theirs
alone.

What we are able to keep
are scant remembrances -
a face, a laugh, an address
we can never revisit -

only what is weightless
and green.