Lenox Aubade

for Amy Clampitt

I grew my hair out
in a depression. Let it knot
into a forum for the birds
in my thoughts, sparked
into actuality

in the wee dark. What wills them
awake? An early
sentry, then the rest
beckoning? Coordinates rising
when stars in the lifting night
are falling.

Letting them nest,
I felt their joy
accumulate, until I was ugly
no longer, but a self divorced
from a body:

beach of grit
and sea glass, bit driftwood, God-
forsaken ovaries, ashes
buried beneath a listing tree, decades
of love, the burned,
uxorious husband.

Becoming the sleep
of the sleigh bed, convinced
by a piccolo hither
and flourish, bashful
and easeful notes, a bridge of love-
making scoring sun
across earth again.

Paula Bohince