It is burning; it is raining, and you hum a requiem. / Dusk dawning featherless. / Do not say
even if i die, there will be more heroes after me. / Do not say all things shall come to an end. / It is
much too early for that. Look at me, take my hand: / can you not feel the gold / that surges in these frostbitten joints? / How they connect your arteries / to conduct love and divinity? / Take
off those / barbed wire crowns, / and weave them into / laurels of primrose and alyssum.

We are not so driftless on this earth.

Slowly, the sun rises / and the world melts at its seams. / The horizon, / like limelights, / casts a
show of shadows on display. / Leaves trembling / with your ghosts and fears, / you hide your face
between your palms. / Golden hour leaking / on your skin, / you mutter, / Turn away. / You do not
want to see.

Uncover your eyes, I say, Open them.

These ghosts are the gilded light / that gleams through the mist, / the ocean waves / that capture the first beams of day. / They are the winds / that trail the highway-side-poppies, / and the clapping of palm trees / after the rain. / They forgive you. / They sing a pavane for you. / They dance for you.

Take my hand again — / I will show you how they bless our name. / So, breathe: / witness how the sun
rises, / how the parched hills / will bloom with the spring rain. / Let's be happy / until the end of our
days. / Let's listen to a pavane / and dance with the ghosts / who follow us.