Somewhere I hear kids barking
diesel smells baking off the highway
eleven kinds of feeling bad somewhere
the kids throwing stones at bottles
recycling their tall angers
into crazy bird-like laughter.

This is when caterpiller bulbs
butterfly out of the ground,
onion grass like wild hair
and eleven kinds of green
smile out of the earth.
How can there be so many ways
to live and only one to die?

Eleven Aprils circling about
like the first measure of time
pictures and wrinkles on the stone
the oldest look at the sky,
that first look, that memory
that big secret of stars and wonder
holding Sara in my arms
with eleven kinds of April in our eyes.

Long stares out the window
as the the ten years march ahead
leaving April on the ground,
a month, a decade, a lifetime
a furtive glance good bye
eleven numbers on a fast clock
missing an hour, week to week
missing hours, and somewhere
one last look at the sky
one last way to live
one last look from the window
watching her drive, drive away.

One last look at the sky.