She said our boy was now a butterfly. 
I was trying to stop my mind. 
Everything terrified. 
A world without him in it. 
Another said, however bad you feel
today, a year from now 
you will feel twice as bad. 

If only, everything.

For years I tried to help my mother,
then she was dead too. What mattered?
You have to do it.  
Maybe a heron. 
Maybe a single white pigeon
in a whole gray flock. 

The woman who wrote about
entering her own kitchen at dusk 
for therapy made sense. Glint of pot
on burner, empty-mouthed, patient.
Single spoon lined by bowl.