Mary Oliver's Bone

for Abe

Today, I read him Mary Oliver's Bone.
He loves it so, he cries
and cries
until the tears
fall
into his mouth
and flood
the tide she searches for
in the ear
bone
of the pilot whale
she finds
on the beach
in Provincetown.

In Seattle,
her book re-
turned
to our shelf
I fold
our hearts
in-
to each other
as we sleep
in-
to the
wet
night.

-Esther Altshul Helfgott