Legato

(Italian: bound)

As when a crow flies up from a field, the sky
accepts the weight of birds.
The crow's shadow falls to earth, and earth
accepts the shadow as if it were a house or tree.
Roots go down, blind as moles
and as eager. And in the house, each day
light moves across the bed.

Even with you gone, light moves on the bed
and I wake up. There's an arc
between the living and the dead, as when
a crow rises from a field, sun on its back.
Below, the shadow moving.

Copyright © 2007 Mary Cornish All rights reserved
from Red Studio
Oberlin College Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission