after Brian Teare, for Hillary

Except dew of morning
no rain marks the shoulder, relaxed
into neon. Drought is a specific kind
of lack, rough to touch,
translucent, but we pay in many ways
for grass. I like information, and you liked
when I thought in my poems.
The edge of a hand shielding an eye
and the pupil simple as a carnation
opens or lops off, heavy
and strangely vertical.
We lay in the field, green ghosts
in different times
expensive to keep alive.
When your friend spoke a hummingbird appeared,
and I was so embarrassed by it
because I was so sad.
Standing on the side
of a small mountain as the red forest
spilled in the rain, I almost came home.
I experienced a fever
but ignored it, I experienced the world
as a bowl, as round, as if
with a thought
I could roll it back.