for Patrick Lane
poems are/ what we die with…
your weathered body
smelling of earth
unwashed still
lips sealed
new lines
yet unwritten
salt on the tongue
not the knot known
but the not knowing
an I after the I
a wound that speaks
an ongoing guess
of what best to do
that next step
inside your own boots
you stood with the other
wrote no paeans of praise
only thanks for not yet dying
speech like bread on the table
bade us breath the same air
bones for punctuation
a cot in a cold house
your troubled oats
flesh no more free
than each syllable
or counted line
crows interrupt
wounds go unhealed
rays of light die
Nicholas Power 