I had nothing but tears
warm as blood
a hemorrhage of grief
all that day and through the night.
They took my nail file and pocket knife
and set someone there
on constant watch
in case I found the sudden
energy to act.
But I’d lost so much,
the flow of tears like blood
from an untended wound
diminished me
hour by hour
until I had
nothing to take me
from one night to the next.
I was too far away
for words to reach
that morning when the chaplain came.
Instead of prayer she took her violin
and played for us,
five people in a small room
all broken, stopped, defeated,
derailed, unfit, caught up in knots,
dumb with sorrow–
And music fell on us
like sweet rain,
a blessed absolution
outside the rules of pain.
