[Water gone black inside the memory of what remains]
Adam Clay

Water gone black inside the memory of what remains

of ice and carved out bones with marrow gone dry.

 

A hand for such jobs and patience for such pain.

 

Laugh alive.

 

Laugh fifteen holes into the ground—no,

 

not just barely—into the dark dirt, the place of worms, the place beyond sound.

 

Maybe the song I never invented but wish I had

hums throughout the cell

 

between my ears. Maybe the music isn’t even music at all.