1. Then
My parents and the parents
of others were pillars of meat
the sky’s blue roof rested on.
Around them grew flowers
with stalks so thin they bent
double with their own red weight,
their blossoms brushed the dust.
2. The Change
All that summer a gray
flotilla of clouds drifted above;
clouds that had hauled up
into themselves all earth’s tears.
Clarity of air. Each dusk
I watched them lower their anchors
into the parched fields:
heavy glass statues of women.
