Gardner’s Song

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The tomb was a mouth 
that knew one note: grief. 
The rock lips opened, 
closed: tight as a safe. 

The slab of stone where he lay:
the cave’s heavy tongue. His pale
skin reflected the pale walls 
where candlelight shone cool, 

like the moon rising on a quiet
world. Apostles and women 
buttered skin with minty lotion,
wrapped him in cold linen. 

This all feels like night, 
the way the shadows play 
on a flickering wall. Outside, 
the world recycles another day. 

It’s morning when I see 
stone rolled away, and drop 
my shears, abandon roses. 
I run to the lip, stop, 

hear a rustle within. Angels 
are waking the man with song-
with voices like birds and words
not words at all, but the tongue

of fire and wind. Voices so clear
I almost understand them,
can’t turn and run. A call to me,
to enter the deafening tomb 

bold as lightning. When I finally
peek in, angels have fled 
and the dead man sits there
with a bottle of wine, some bread. 

I sit beside him, who wrestles
the bottle open, never flags.
He pours me the wine liberally
and himself drinks the dregs.