HOMECOMING

His hands, fingers lost to the war,
struggle to pin small clothes in the trees
believing his dead son
will find them, dress up,
come home for dinner.


As he hangs cloth blossoms
on the branches,
he doesn't know
his son will never wear
those clothes again.

The details of this life
have tumbled backwards
through the blue space
of years like dried weeds.

The ground loosened between them,
he sets the table and waits
under the stained-glass window
for the dying to be done,
while the sun,
lowered in the western sky,
gathers the colored panes
softly places them,
like a ring of flowers,
on the linen cloth
beneath the old man's hands.