Rain Choral

Again, a child is the missing letter

in this algebra of grief,

slips out of the company of broken men

furling into a country of themselves.

I watch him meld into the loop of kids

gathered around a relief truck

in a procession of songs.

They join arms, hopping.

It is how they teach a quiet return to love,

these kids shedding weights

their bodies became too frail to bear.

Their litanies echo in the dark,

beseeching days ahead to be kinder.