by Wilda Morris

Night Stand


Jane Kenyon thinks
she is dead. She
writes no more
poetry. Leukemia,
not melancholy,
dragged her away.
But she sits
beside my bed,
whispers in my ear
of cows in the snow,
cats by the stove,
rock, leaf, bird song,
love, death, lies,
the silver thimble
and the medicine jar.
All night she begs
me to read aloud.

Published in SecondWind,
No. 4 (Winter 2004).