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Even the coldest day seems to have ended.
Even the youngest baby in his backpack is alert
and the panhandlers forgiving. Today, even
the guy with the tattooed face. His regular-
looking kid finds comfort in that face, finds even
an available corner. Even your two guitars
on their stands are keeping secrets.
Two different tunings! Even two orioles
one hour in our fruit tree made an assumption,
and I assume they'll be back. Even our two
small trees make me proud like an aristocrat
when they bloom, what I love is how they bow
to me in the morning. Even I remember walking
home from school by a crab apple tree and envying
it's orange-brown detritus. That school,
infinitely in my mind. The halls and small doors
and recurring pledges. Even the empty auditorium
is infinite, rows stretching back to a dark spot
I can't see. Most of what I’m dealing with here
I can't see. That's exactly why I got so excited
about the female cardinal, the red flash of truth
as she went. Even the rat you killed with a mallet.
Even the deer who came into the kitchen. Even the
baby’s appearance like a shock of gray. Even the Rabbi,
when his head was bare, talked about an extraordinary visit
from a good priest who held his hand when he was sick,
sick, and after the recovery never said boo about it.
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