The house, when it falls, suggests a house was there.
It stood. It kept off rain. Now people come
as if to the ruins of an ancient city,
where their fathers lived with their mothers in love.

They bring flowers, living reminders of loss.
They will be lost too. They are already dead,
working out for themselves what no one else
can bear to do, can bear at all. The house,

when it falls, will be the place, the acre of joy.
It will heal like a wound heals and leave no scar.
It will remind us of colossal loss.

How insignificant our losses are.
The dead don’t cover their arms in the sun.
Their faces stare straight up into the sky.