by Susanna Childress
Tell me snow is falling on the willows now, fat, full, unhurried,
for my strawberry-haired nephew sleeps, his body beneath
a blanket knit brilliantly blue, his body wilted with
neuroblastoma, and here on the couch, I hold his head
and wonder at what’s sent from above, what we’d
believe drifts down during these months of ice, so far north
we need Easter to end winter for us—not Eostre, Teutonic myth,
vernal equinox, not eggs, red-iris bunnies, beribboned
sweets. Tell me what comes next: tires spinning, marrow
aspirating, gladiolus whispering when, when, Wednesday
ashing our brows and, for each, some coruscating stretch, most
Fridays not so good after all. Last week he told his mum, I get a new
body if I go to heaven. Tell me it’s coming soon, Pascha Sunday,
that, as they lift, our arms will ache, will awaken, with all we’ve lost.
