Trying to Know

his mother weeping at the sink, his father

turning his back to it all, rising to go

to the barn, his brothers glued to the TV

so that all he knew were backs, the humped

unanswering surfaces, each year since

he was conscious of a year having gone.

I think they must have seen it coming,

the times when it felt as if someone

was watching and they looked up only

to have him look away, walk away, offer

the blank of his own back for them to study.

We can't know if he thought he was doing

them a favor, or if he wanted to stop after

the first or the second. He went to his brothers

in their morning sleep, muffling the gunshot

with a pillow maybe, and then to his mother

milking inside the barn. How can a boy

go into his own backyard and take back

his birth, obliterate a bond, then turn

to find the father who was left? Dust to

dust, he dumped his body in the cemetery,

then lay down with him there. So we have

our lesson in love beyond bleakness, our

six simple coffins filling their holes.

If he looked around as though this was

any morning when he came in late from chores,

he could see how far beyond reason the sunrise

was, the fog drifting over the pond, or later,

sunset-a crimson swath left on the horizon.