Speak Grief

a poem

I would speak
of grief but find I do not
know the language. It settles
in the hollow of a mug,
dredges of an emptied cup
I might interpret if I spoke the language
of divination but of earth I am. Dust

settles upon Victorian seats,
makes you grit
your teeth, eddies around worn banks
like river tears. I consider
the average age of eyelashes
and wonder that anything might last
beyond this current divination,

this experiment, content
and discontent at tracing lines
of letters I do not recognize,
sounding out syllables
that form into objects foreign
to my eyes. Is the boundary between
dust and ash no more concrete

than concrete walls rising, dividing
a nation, offering lessons
in symmetry but not humanity?
Is sanity an overrated collection
of syllables when sound mind
might do, this boundary
between me and you bridged

by language, every word
different yet sharing meaning,
disparate parts leading toward some
whole, this soul-swept feeling
echoing, resounding from cluttered
spaces toward wide open places.