Fire harvests my dreams
as God is spoken
when ashes stir the wind.
Women wash themselves
in such residue,
knead bread from the chalk
of the bone dead
while singing an anthem
in keening dirge.
Each day arrives to me
weary, and I cover it
with shrouds of a dried heart.
The bird that is silent
is the only one that can
wait its hunger out
in myrtle branches
emptied of their black berries.
