Poetry

Combing my hair, a sudden snarl
in the pink teeth.

How silent, death entering.

Wind does one thing with clouds,
 another with leaves;
the clouds go, go, go; the leaves

Since I last looked up
from my book,
another appeared in the room

Dressed to the nines, and she is eighty-six!
A gold lamé gown,
Savage pearls in her pierced earlobes!
Diamonds blazing
That her Grandmother Haynes wore
A century ago!
In Washington City!
Before the War!

This time the leaving felt especially good
  as if I’d moved
toward some clean elemental selfishness

Once, my father took me to the Rockaways
  during a hurricane
to see how the ocean was behaving,

I find, after all these years, I am a believer—
I believe what the thunder and lightning have to say;
I believe that dreams are real,
        and that death has two reprisals;
I believe that dead leaves and black water fill my heart.