How he dropped his keys in the ceramic dish by the door. 
How his teal New Balances reflected the evening sunlight. 
 
How he paced himself leisurely on his walk back home. 
How the sweat beaded in droplets on his beard. 
 
How his delicate heart sat heavy in his chest. 
How none of us knew the truth about it. 
 
How even his doctors had kept it from us. 
How bran was supposed to be a panacea for high cholesterol. 
 
How he’d grill sausages on the patio at midnight. 
How it was probably too late, anyway. 
 
How ‘god’ wasn’t in his vocabulary, or ours. 
How his handwriting wriggled like expiring insects. 
 
How he thought I belonged to a satanic cult. 
How he believed he was an alcoholic because his wife was. 
 
How my stepsister found him at the top of the stairs. 
How he hadn’t had time to get under the shower. 
 
How by the time I got there he was dead. 
How his running shoes shrouded his stiffening feet.

The night was like a fine and brittle clock. 
My moonswept vision ticked from star to star 
scanning the monstrous heavens—riven, charred— 
for signs of life. All was its opposite, 
a hell of insensate constellations 
dark gaseous altars on the kelp-black sky 
 
no heartbeat but our car’s soft engine 
purring along the noiseless country roads. 
 
The lemon sun surprised us with absurd 
laughter of light; we crept onto campus 
a ragged party on the brink of sleep. 
You ran to me. I ran to you. We cried, 
neither fully believing the other’s tears 
until the broken silence spoke: “He died.” 
 
We’re haunted by the winter of his years.

Sometimes I dream you are still here with me 
your bearded visage grinning at some joke 
 
or scherzo unleashed like a Roman candle 
into the night, intrepid as a stone. 
 
A conjuror, I sit at my glass desk 
reinventing you word by word until 
 
my fingers feel the thread begin to snap 
and slip away. One dream recurs 
 
with striking regularity. You phone 
inviting me to dinner at your home. 
 
On arrival, the scene appears normal 
as if we’d never parted, though I’m older 
 
and the feeling is awkward. I inquire 
where you’ve been, why haven’t I heard 
 
from you in so long? You always reply 
you’ve been here the whole time. But where was I? 
 
You’re joviality seems a touch unnatural 
considering you’ve been dead most of my life. 
 
The dream is always severed at this point 
just when I fall for its mythmaking, sold 
 
on a reality I’ll have to reckon with 
the rest of my days. When I awake 
 
you’re gone again, your address fictitious, 
the faces in the dream long since dissolved.