The Penny

when I was a little confused
I was most irredeemable 
but when truly lost
my body blown out
upon the stones of it
— whatever betrayal
whatever crushing
rectangle, whatever
assassinated bird--
I’d found I’d returned
to the old room of
my heart to discover all
the doors unlocked
as if no one had ever
left home, and the
illumination coming through
the windows, tender,
as in morning
or before evening,
the to-ing and fro-ing
hours of life and living
creatures and electrons
my bed still there, a bare patch 
of ground by the woodstove
—simple but worn soft
through suffering--
a cup of tea, still hot
the writing desk
(waiting like a butler)
from which I have always 
been able, before nightfall, 
to compose a poem and die
and in dying, the words
like a coin placed between 
my lips, awaken.
​