In Memory Boxes


...and your fine yellow hair
lilting like a childish song
is finally gone, gone
the handsome brocade
upon your collar.
Your eyes and nose like marbles
roll to corners and the fluttering seductions
of your mouth lie now
utterly still. This is my will,
these are the bric-a-brac Išve broken,
the such-and-such I roughly tucked away so I could touch
the loneliness of your face.


Donald Zirilli
1998