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It is December 8 and my brother Tony was killed by the soldiers. December 8 and the police are reopening the Southern Trolleyways. December 8 when my wife lifts Tony’s body from the ground, his arm tied over her shoulder—her face is damp, her hair dirty. And the soldiers unveil the damn Trolleyways, and I stand feeling (a quick march of bumps across my back and thighs) nothing. When she comes home, I run a bath for Sonya and wash her hair, gently mixing the finest of my brother’s shampoos with quiet precision, while Sonya cries and cries.

I look at you, Alfonso and say to the late caterpillars good morning, Senators! this is a battle worthy of our weapons.

Child. We are done for in the most remarkable ways. — Brigit Pegeen Kelly It would be winter, with a thin snow. An aged sunbeam would fall on me, then on a nearby summit, until a mass of ice would come upon me like a crown of master diamonds in shades of gold and pink. The base of the mountains would be still in darkness. The snow would melt, making the mountain uglier. The ice would undertake a journey toward dying. My iliacus, from which orchids bloom, would learn to take an infant’s shape, some premature creature weaned too soon. My femoral nerve, from which lichen grows in many shades, would learn to take breaths of its own and would issue a moan so labored it could have issued from two women carrying a full-length wooden casket, with dirt made from a girl inside. The dirt would have been buried with all of the girl’s celestial possessions. Bearing the casket would demand more muscles than earthbound horses have. The girl would have been twenty-four. This was my visio. Sometimes I think of it as prophecy. Other times, history. For years it was akin to some specific land, with a vessel that would come for me, able to cross land, sea, the spaces of the universe, able to burrow deep into the ground. Anything could summon it — a breaking in cloud cover, wind chimes catching salt outside my mother’s window, a corner of a painting. And I learned how to call it, too. This is the only skill of which I have ever been proud. When my sister died, from the head of my visio came offspring in the thousands, armed to the teeth, each its own vessel. My first, their mother, lived on. For itself and its hoard it found a permanent home in a cave at the bottom of a lake. And it waited until I was standing on a mountain to sing to me: You will call this mountain home until I tell you to move again. There will always be more of it underground than you

The night we got bashed we told Rusty how they drove up, yelled QUEER, threw a hot dog, sped off. Rusty:Now, is that gaybashing? Or are they just calling you queer? Good point. Josey pitied the fools: who buys a perfectly good pack of wieners and drives around San Francisco chucking them at gays? And who speeds off? Missing the point, the pleasure of the bash? Dear bashers, you should have seen the hot dog hit my neck, the scarf Josey sewed from antique silk kimonos:so gay. You missed laughing at us, us confused, your raw hot dog on the ground. Josey and Rusty and Bob make fun of the gaybashers, and I wash my scarf in the sink. I use Woolite. We worry about insurance, interest rates. Not hot dogs thrown from F-150s, homophobic freaks. After the bashing, we used the ATM in the sex shop next to Annie's Social Club, smiled at the kind owner, his handlebar mustache. Astrud Gilberto sang tall and tan and young and lovely, the girl from Ipanema... and the dildos gleamed from the walls, a hundred cheerful colors. In San Francisco it rains hot dogs, pity-the-fool. Ass-sized penguins, cock after cock in azure acrylic, butterscotch glass, anyone's flesh-tone, chrome.

Death, thou wast once an uncouth hideous thing, Nothing but bones, The sad effect of sadder groans: Thy mouth was open, but thou couldst not sing. For we considered thee as at some six Or ten years hence, After the loss of life and sense, Flesh being turned to dust, and bones to sticks. We looked on this side of thee, shooting short; Where we did find The shells of fledge souls left behind, Dry dust, which sheds no tears, but may extort. But since our Savior’s death did put some blood Into thy face, Thou art grown fair and full of grace, Much in request, much sought for as a good. For we do now behold thee gay and glad, As at Doomsday; When souls shall wear their new array, And all thy bones with beauty shall be clad. Therefore we can go die as sleep, and trust Half that we have Unto an honest faithful grave; Making our pillows either down, or dust.

It sweats into the tongue and groove of redwood decks with a Tahoe view. It slides under the truck where some knuckles are getting banged up on a stuck nut. It whirls in the egg whites. Among blacks and whites spread evenly. Inside the chicken factory, the Falcon 7 x , and under the bridge. There’s death by taxi, by blood clot, by slippery rug. Death by oops and flood, by drone and gun. Death with honor derides death without. Realpolitik and offshore accounts are erased like a thumb drive lost in a fire. And the friendly crow sets out walnuts to pop under tires. So let’s walk the ruins, let’s walk along the ocean and listen to death’s undying devotion.

He came home with his right leg made a bit shorter but they didn’t notice. A landmine did it, he said to himself, and I was the only one who heard him because I followed him everywhere like a son. He hobbled when no one was looking, and I hobbled behind him. When he plucked an iris, I plucked the one next to it, and we thought of purple evening clouds. When he killed a butterfly, he’d take off the wings first, then crush it with his fingers and smell it. I tried to catch one, but it flitted away. He wanted to build a huge power plant to keep us from disappearing. I nodded and pointed out all the recent deaths, how quick they were, tomatoes not as plump as they used to be, the maple trees discolored, their branches like veins with no fat around them. All this, he decided, meant we needed new things. But I disagreed on this: why new, why not old me, I who have lived here for many years even before he was born, but he didn’t listen. Mosquitoes come and go, full and happy. Outside the window, the plant looms over the village. It looks prettier than I thought, which makes me want to kiss it, but I know it will burn my lips and I won’t be able to speak to anyone with my charred mouth. I saw him dressed up for a meeting, and they shouted, blaming him for his empty head, for wanting too much. The next time I saw him he was in bed, old and delirious. He opened his eyes, and held my hand for the first time, and said, Don’t push yourself, come back alive. He was buried in his ever-vanishing land, and I flew off into my friendless life.

Death found strange beauty on that cherub brow, And dash’d it out. – There was a tint of rose O’er cheek and lip; – he touch’d the veins with ice, And the rose faded. – Forth from those blue eyes There spake a wistful tenderness, – a doubt Whether to grieve or sleep, which Innocence Alone can wear. – With ruthless haste he bound The silken fringes of their curtaining lids Forever. – There had been a murmuring sound With which the babe would claim its mother’s ear, Charming her even to tears. – The spoiler set His seal of silence. – But there beam’d a smile, So fix’d and holy from that marble brow, – Death gazed and left it there; – he dared not steal The signet-ring of Heaven.

Mary sat musing on the lamp-flame at the table Waiting for Warren. When she heard his step, She ran on tip-toe down the darkened passage To meet him in the doorway with the news And put him on his guard. ‘Silas is back.’ She pushed him outward with her through the door And shut it after her. ‘Be kind,’ she said. She took the market things from Warren’s arms And set them on the porch, then drew him down To sit beside her on the wooden steps. ‘When was I ever anything but kind to him? But I’ll not have the fellow back,’ he said. ‘I told him so last haying, didn’t I? If he left then, I said, that ended it. What good is he? Who else will harbor him At his age for the little he can do? What help he is there’s no depending on. Off he goes always when I need him most. He thinks he ought to earn a little pay, Enough at least to buy tobacco with, So he won’t have to beg and be beholden. “All right,” I say, “I can’t afford to pay Any fixed wages, though I wish I could.” “Someone else can.” “Then someone else will have to.” I shouldn’t mind his bettering himself If that was what it was. You can be certain, When he begins like that, there’s someone at him Trying to coax him off with pocket-money,— In haying time, when any help is scarce. In winter he comes back to us. I’m done.’ ‘Sh! not so loud: he’ll hear you,’ Mary said. ‘I want him to: he’ll have to soon or late.’ ‘He’s worn out. He’s asleep beside the stove. When I came up from Rowe’s I found him here, Huddled against the barn-door fast asleep, A miserable sight, and frightening, too— You needn’t smile—I didn’t recognize him— I wasn’t looking for him—and he’s changed. Wait till you see.’ ‘Where did you say he’d been?’ ‘He didn’t say. I dragged him to the house, And gave him tea and tried to make him smoke. I tried to make him talk about his travels. Nothing would do: he just kept nodding off.’ ‘What did he say? Did he say anything?’ ‘But little.’ ‘Anything? Mary, confess He said he’d come to ditch the meadow for me.’ ‘Warren!’ ‘But did he? I just want to know.’ ‘Of course he did. What would you have him say? Surely you wouldn’t grudge the poor old man Some humble way to save his self-respect. He added, if you really care to know, He meant to clear the upper pasture, too. That sounds like something you have heard before? Warren, I wish you could have heard the way He jumbled everything. I stopped to look Two or three times—he made me feel so queer— To see if he was talking in his sleep. He ran on Harold Wilson—you remember— The boy you had in haying four years since. He’s finished school, and teaching in his college. Silas declares you’ll have to get him back. He says they two will make a team for work: Between them they will lay this farm as smooth! The way he mixed that in with other things. He thinks young Wilson a likely lad, though daft On education—you know how they fought All through July under the blazing sun, Silas up on the cart to build the load, Harold along beside to pitch it on.’ ‘Yes, I took care to keep well out of earshot.’ ‘Well, those days trouble Silas like a dream. You wouldn’t think they would. How some things linger! Harold’s young college boy’s assurance piqued him. After so many years he still keeps finding Good arguments he sees he might have used. I sympathize. I know just how it feels To think of the right thing to say too late. Harold’s associated in his mind with Latin. He asked me what I thought of Harold’s saying He studied Latin like the violin Because he liked it—that an argument! He said he couldn’t make the boy believe He could find water with a hazel prong— Which showed how much good school had ever done him. He wanted to go over that. But most of all He thinks if he could have another chance To teach him how to build a load of hay—’ ‘I know, that’s Silas’ one accomplishment. He bundles every forkful in its place, And tags and numbers it for future reference, So he can find and easily dislodge it In the unloading. Silas does that well. He takes it out in bunches like big birds’ nests. You never see him standing on the hay He’s trying to lift, straining to lift himself.’ ‘He thinks if he could teach him that, he’d be Some good perhaps to someone in the world. He hates to see a boy the fool of books. Poor Silas, so concerned for other folk, And nothing to look backward to with pride, And nothing to look forward to with hope, So now and never any different.’ Part of a moon was falling down the west, Dragging the whole sky with it to the hills. Its light poured softly in her lap. She saw it And spread her apron to it. She put out her hand Among the harp-like morning-glory strings, Taut with the dew from garden bed to eaves, As if she played unheard some tenderness That wrought on him beside her in the night. ‘Warren,’ she said, ‘he has come home to die: You needn’t be afraid he’ll leave you this time.’ ‘Home,’ he mocked gently. ‘Yes, what else but home? It all depends on what you mean by home. Of course he’s nothing to us, any more Than was the hound that came a stranger to us Out of the woods, worn out upon the trail.’ ‘Home is the place where, when you have to go there, They have to take you in.’ ‘I should have called it Something you somehow haven’t to deserve.’ Warren leaned out and took a step or two, Picked up a little stick, and brought it back And broke it in his hand and tossed it by. ‘Silas has better claim on us you think Than on his brother? Thirteen little miles As the road winds would bring him to his door. Silas has walked that far no doubt today. Why didn’t he go there? His brother’s rich, A somebody—director in the bank.’ ‘He never told us that.’ ‘We know it though.’ ‘I think his brother ought to help, of course. I’ll see to that if there is need. He ought of right To take him in, and might be willing to— He may be better than appearances. But have some pity on Silas. Do you think If he’d had any pride in claiming kin Or anything he looked for from his brother, He’d keep so still about him all this time?’ ‘I wonder what’s between them.’ ‘I can tell you. Silas is what he is—we wouldn’t mind him— But just the kind that kinsfolk can’t abide. He never did a thing so very bad. He don’t know why he isn’t quite as good As anyone. Worthless though he is, He won’t be made ashamed to please his brother.’ ‘I can’t think Si ever hurt anyone.’ ‘No, but he hurt my heart the way he lay And rolled his old head on that sharp-edged chair-back. He wouldn’t let me put him on the lounge. You must go in and see what you can do. I made the bed up for him there tonight. You’ll be surprised at him—how much he’s broken. His working days are done; I'm sure of it.’ ‘I’d not be in a hurry to say that.’ ‘I haven’t been. Go, look, see for yourself. But, Warren, please remember how it is: He’s come to help you ditch the meadow. He has a plan. You mustn’t laugh at him. He may not speak of it, and then he may. I’ll sit and see if that small sailing cloud Will hit or miss the moon.’ It hit the moon. Then there were three there, making a dim row, The moon, the little silver cloud, and she. Warren returned—too soon, it seemed to her, Slipped to her side, caught up her hand and waited. ‘Warren,’ she questioned. ‘Dead,’ was all he answered.

What do I owe to you Who loved me deep and long? You never gave my spirit wings Nor gave my heart a song. But oh, to him I loved, Who loved me not at all, I owe the little open gate That led through heaven’s wall.