Last Bender

Digging in a Pot

I imagine you bald
digging in a pot
with a spoon

Sunlight
between fingers
cells fight
to fatten the cloth

Remains pile up
books in folds
of sheets and gowns

Too small to wear
the wasted sack
I long ago first tasted

Evening like a peel
of bitter orange
the river’s pewter eddy
sluggish
in the uptown decade

When we
went hand to hand
mouth to mouth

First told
to the quiet strain of ear