The Human Remains
A few scattered bones Some tea leaves A broken compact Scant evidence Silent and troubling Miles high The sky is full With the empty promise of heaven Down here? Who knows Two people Maybe more But only one had thought “We are friends” A breeze Like a fever Spends itself It sweeps through a stand of yellow pine Parting ‘round telephone poles Combing through fields of green wheat And gently brushing the wildflowers The wildflowers play no part Though their pollen has spread everywhere And lays over everything The remains settle With the evening A dog makes an important discovery But no one will ever know The night rises A careless witness to The birds the leaves the air and flying insects The worms and voles the bit players the extras the vagrants the coincidence of heat and damp and soil and rot All of it All of it Is evidence All of it Collected and collecting The weather 500 miles away A bird in a cat’s mouth The chipped edge of a floral China tea cup Bits of tea in a shallow pool A broken compact Reflecting a rye smile
So beautifully expressed the tragic theme of the poem. I love: "The sky is full with empty promise of heaven." Remarkable note about two people, "Only one had thought /We are friends."
The last four lines of the last stanza logically repeat the theme of the poem and the image of the chipped teacup, broken compact, reflecting a rye smile is devastating, for me.
Arthur, this is heartbreakingly poignant, and so dear to my heart. Sometimes I think how by thinking about the marginalized we are marginalizing a whole lot, and I can never quite catch myself running where margins no longer matter. If that makes sense!
🕊️
Mahdi