WOULD COME BACK tongued and talking, laughing off

the soot and small hallways where he had to crouch

and squirm to get through, not fearing close spaces

as when he lived, for all is puzzle, a game

to come on the clues: miniature dog in full point,

monogrammed robe, a globe, three screws

and an oscillator, mashed landscape from a train set—.

how does it all fit in? Now he has his brown study, all the quiet

he wants, and no one can distract him from his thoughtwork,

whirr and pulse of machine in machine, nobody

to bother him with origin or end, as if he has his first mind,

not his last. Without hand-hold or leg-hold, hearth-tender

and in full kilter, he would come and be the gathering in my head,

the grave inside I tend and tend, the one that is blackening soft.