Rind

So oddly shaped and dear, this head,
with its glossy black dressing:
the shape of a filbert meat.

The hair runs silk through my fingers, and
I can roll it like a trackball. You would think
it meant a heart at rest; you would think
it precluded the biting back of tears. You would be
an old fool.

Oh wind, oh rain, oh God, oh dear,
the grief runs on and on so straight:
A long-distance runner, pounding
on the grass of empty hills.

Up hill and down hill: an echo of feet
that clutch now, nerveless rinds,
in the tray of a wheelchair. As if

someone forgot to trim the claws
from a drumstick in a school lunch:
as if his shoes
were not still by the door.