Magnolia stellata—
Your funereal bloom
Petals the ground still damp with rain,
Softens my ragged, encumbered pace
That wants to loiter and receive
Your gestured reprieve,
And remain stationed in your sullen grace
Beyond the pensive transport of night
Rolling by and gathering
All wreaths
Like smoky, mingled constellations
Into its colder arms,
And carrying with them
The maimed pallor of its own endless return.
To this place also in memory only
Will I myself come again,
Setting coarser or darkened shroud
Over your barest abstraction of stars…
