The Cross

When enough people die or begin
their descent in January,
walking a dark highway
into other people’s heaven,
or drinking childhood pain
to ashes, it’s enough to break
any woman of poetry.
I grow tired of pouring
my body into words.
It’s embarrassing. Absurd
to think they could hold me
like four urns on a funeral table
that will drive in four directions,
my flesh finally the cross without
the dead Christ metaphor.

2015