from "Under the Maud Moon" • In Case Of Actual Death

10 Notes

from “Under the Maud Moon”

And in the days
when you find yourself orphaned,
emptied
of all wind-singing, of light,
the pieces of cursed bread on your tongue,

may there come back to you
a voice,
spectral, calling you
sister!
from everything that dies.

And then
you shall open
this book, even if it is the book of nightmares.

—Galway Kinnell