Member Poem

Vigil

The woman climbs into bed with her sleeping husband,
as she’s done thousands of times, though never in a bed
seven stories above streets dusted with ice crystals and cinders.
Sounds of the unit at night: beeps, the rustle of sheets,
a fan dispersing heat evenly in the room.
We can’t know what dreams infuse the woman’s sleep.
When dawn comes, she may give no thought to the empty house,
miles from here, where they raised their children,
watched them fly away to Manhattan and LA.
The house will be there when all this is done,
when the man’s irreverent spirit departs.
She turns from the monitors, edges closer to her beloved
as if she could make her body melt into his,
as on their first night together.