Brothers in Arms

The sea was one thing, once; the field another. Either way,

something got crossed, or didn’t. Who’s to say, about

happiness? Whatever country, I mean, where inconceivable

was a word like any other lies far behind me now. I’ve

learned to spare what’s failing, if it can keep what’s living

alive still, maybe just

awhile longer. Ghost bamboo that

the birds nest in, for example, not noticing the leaves, color

of surrender, color of poverty as I used to imagine it when

I myself was poor but had no idea of it. I’ve always thought

gratitude’s the one correct response to having been made,

however painfully, to see this life more up close. The higher

gods having long refused me, let the gods deemed lesser

do the best they can — so a friend I somewhere along the way

lost hold of used to drunkenly announce, usually just before

passing out. I think he actually believed that stuff; he must

surely, by now, be dead. There’s a rumored

humbling effect

to loss that I bear no trace of. It’s not loss that humbles me.

What used to look like memory — clouds for hours breaking,

gathering, then breaking up again — lately seems instead

like a dance, one of those slower, too complicated numbers

I never had much time for. Not knowing exactly what it’s

come to is so much different from understanding that it’s come

to nothing. Why is it, then, each day, they feel more the same?

riverrun