If I could I would send your memory away like snowmelt
gently, like mist rising from the side of the tree trunks
the sun hits first. I would let you rise and float away
like something uncrumpling from a cocoon and
filling with lightness, fluttering away on its own or a late-fall leaf
finally thin enough for the wind to carry. If I could
I would turn you into a vee of geese, something heralding
a new season by its leaving or something that is noticed only
by its absence; the way we don’t think about the water
that leaves when the moon pulls, but see only the treasures
left to us in the tidepools when it is gone. But I am more
like a blind night swimmer, more penguin than egret
Have always wished for wings to fly south with too
instead of these two clay feet that just keep rooting further
down in, as the farewell songs rain down like
bird calls. Like feathers. Like the prayers flung
from brass wheels on mountaintops
on the other side of the world. Or something like
what the damned dog hears from a whistle
that’s silent to everyone else.
©2009 Annie Farnsworth
