Dedicated to my little sister, Corrine.

In my own morning there is silence, here
The sounds of breathing are enough to shock;
The darkness has not found me yet this year.

Across the pale blank sky the sounds of fear
Are drifting, born from waking lands, and knock
At my own morning. There is silence here.

And then the voices enter in: the tear-
Stained home, the hungry child. I have no lock,
The darkness has not found me yet this year.

They draw me on toward grief. Side, front, and rear,
The ill-spent life, the widow, unmoved mock
At my own mourning. There is silence here,

All vanish, and the trucks, the birds I hear,
Loud, obnoxious. Slow, back and forth I rock.
The darkness has not found me yet this year.

A quiet body perched on the thorn,
Submitted to an arduous repose.
As gentle winds embrace its bulging form,

The larva's rigid crown is broken, torn
Until antennae sever and expose
A quiet body, perching on the thorn.

Convulsions burst upon the splintered horn,
Relent as outer separation slows,
And gentle winds embrace an empty form

Below a second figure, newly born.
Though cloven from itself, inside there grows
A quiet body, perching on the thorn,

Awaiting dawn, when golden light will warm
The tree. That morning comes! Beside a rose
-As gentle winds embrace its spreading form-

My mother cried the day they took our still,
Of grief, I think; not, as they said, from fear.
And Pa looked on, eyes blazing fit to kill.

They said that they was grieved to do us ill,
To throw our business out upon its ear.
My mother cried the day they took our still.

The sheriff in his trilby, tie and twill—
His deputies snuck in around the rear,
And Pa looked on, eyes blazing fit to kill.

To see her weeping gave my heart a chill;
When Grandpa died, she didn't shed a tear.
My mother cried the day they took our still.

They doused our fire, and with an iron will
They smashed our many jugs of amber clear,
And Pa looked on, eyes blazing fit to kill.