(dis)missive

children
on the shining path
to nowhere

mothers
in liquefaction
fathers

who in death
stretch their
tendons

into
stick figures
running in moonlight

are my family
their skin, their eyes
that love me

but death is not with child
nor is she a soliloquy
droned through deep water

nor stop motion
milk spilt black
neither death nor life

exist this Saturday
at three o’clock
in the empty hospital

where warm fingers
drum equipment
waiting