A Grave

Rain, for once, is not an earth’s elbow, so where now do blue jays gurgle in memory? It slackens as the frost recedes, the glacial air clumsy under prepared limbs, nature’s refulgent shift.

No gray earth remains as softly fallen leaves, so silent now, fall back in unison, I touch the ground, resting against the cool dome of air: grave, she rests while lifting.

The multifarious sound, nature still weaving on, a slow dying wind, remains. The surface of the flower turns grave of frost as fern.

It shows what we’ve recycled, in its press of novelty, a simple eyebrow asking, who moved fast while even such silence/continued?

• Marianne Moore