that which was once throaty and clear, now a whisper, a breath

If I could only call up her image
when I wanted I would.

But she comes and goes
as she pleases, and won't stop

until she is everything
that ever came and left at once--

a small bird circling a field
over a farm in rural Virginia

that can't land,
no branch, no place

for restless wings,
the kind of day where all tracks

have washed away
after the midday storm,

the way the mind
can slip in and out of memory:

the trail is cold,
but not exactly cold,

and so she is fading slowly
into the distance, her voice

the last of the mockingbirds
in late fall, singular

and clustered at once,
ramping up and winding down,

until finally a remoteness--
that which was once

throaty and clear,
now a whisper, a breath

at the end of its air,
a collapse lung;

juxtaposition of hard rock tattoo
on pale white shoulder

against frilly dress and steel-toed boots
walking out into the field

behind the barn, then farther,
to the next field,

the last image
I can call of her

a broken bird
hiding in the brush,

that which I wish to gather
in my hands but dare not,

or else it will forever
be abandoned by the flock

she's in my view,
a glimmer of her,

whole and brilliant,
utterly unthinkable, then is gone.

[Teresa Leo, 'Memory is a Kind of Broken Promise', from Bloom in Reverse]