The Red Thread of Sorrow

Inside a box I will lay

my latest sorrows against all

the older ones—I will sew them on

like buttons that match the look 

of a frayed shirt, or add them to

the stash of coins in the dashboard, 

ready tithe for a parking meter. I am

heartsick again, heartsick for things 

I could not save, for the umbrella's 

broken rib that I did not mend;

for the child who by not speaking 

to me is unchoosing me. 

Before my body was

a country that housed lives 

then pushed them out into their 

exile, it too was its own monument 

to solitude. Inside a box I have 

enough sorrows to ransom other

sorrows, enough to barter for some 

small trinket in the market of happiness. 

I am not looking for gold links to the eternal, 

nor for the exit out of a dream.  But I 

have brought nearly everything I have 

to the center of the labyrinth, where 

perhaps one last sad, terrible mouth waits 

either to swallow me whole or spit me out