Out of the darkness, men come 
     with knives. They work quickly, 
muttering back and forth. 

It was white I wanted —of snow, clouds, of sky overcast, of
       a star if you take the shine from it. Usual
           sound, light, and I wake—but sense a shift

Ava taught me how to smoke
in the woods behind our high-school dorm. 
We lay back laughing in the dirt.

I know Grace
who speaks to fire.
She tells this on herself

She was older, sleek, and had a bite to her, but I was bolder with my knees on either side of her.

My father naked in the photo, young
again, crouched among rocks and water. It's an island,
a time so long ago he is thin,

flickers across the bed.
I reach for you,
brush the hair from your face,

I am exhumed on the express
Out of the aftermath of five,
And though I starve on consciousness

The sun hangs on the blistered rock,
The Jew hangs in the sun;
The clamorers are done

The knots tied by a river
become lost ends as the tangles
and meanders separate, cut off