Again and again

I have watched her die so many times
since this afternoon. The mandala of blood.
The small ruination: her shopping scattered,
oranges rolling slowly towards the sewer grate,
a shoe that had somehow landed by the payphone.

I saw her, in that last instant when
shopping lists and street signs mattered to her.
I saw her become unjointed and undone.
I saw her body pressed flat to the street
as if she were afraid she’d slip and fall off the earth.

But tonight, the mill of my dreams will work at her.
She will wake for me in a field of blooming poppies,
and I will watch her kick off her shoes
and dance towards those far groves
overdone in sunshine.

Mark Aiello