Chitra Ganesh, To Assemble a Flying Car (detail), 2018, linocut on tan BFK Rives. Courtesy of the artist & Durham Press.
Why Bother Resurrecting the Dead
When their multitudes of affliction may better serve
a second earth
The weeping cherry seems less romantic, now,
having blossomed tiny handkerchiefs
and cast them down—
it belongs to the realm of barn-born kings and the first
born sons of Herod
(whose springs were silenced underground).
It seems this world is moving on, so that the first
word is not, finally, spoken, but
stays on the palate—
as the sparrow stays among the palmetto fronds.
Not still,
or having any thought we think it should—
but warbling in ways we
have not known.
Jane Springer is a doctoral candidate in the creative writing program at Florida State University. Her poems are forthcoming in The Hayden’s Ferry Review (Winter 2006), and The Southern Review (Spring 2006). (updated 5/2006)