Status Updates From Noche fiel y virtuosa

Under the full moon
Maria was folding the washing;
the stiff sheets became
dry white rectangles of moonlight.

Mother died last night,
Mother who never dies.

Winter was in the air,

had not my brother always been steering,
both himself and me, out of our bleak bedroom
into a night of rocks and lakes
punctuated with swords sticking up here and there—

The sky was black. The earth was white and cold.

Feeling has departed—it occurs to me
this would make a fine headstone.