And so it seems to us
this raw spring day, though years
before we two were born he was
a young poet dead.
Poet of our youth-
his "cri du coeur" our own,
his verses "in a broken tongue"
beguiling as an elder
brother's antic lore.
Their sad blackface lilt and croon
survive him like
The happy look (subliminal
of victim, dying man)
a summer's tintypes hold.
The roses flutter in the wind;
we weight their stems
with stones, then drive away.