Elegy, Again
Mike Bove
When maples tip green at the end
of winter, dull and steady, how frightening
to see a thing return from death.
I visited my father’s stone each day
hoping he’d appear there living, wanting
a ride home. I can’t say what I would have
done had he been waiting, Lazurus-
like beneath the oaks and pines. Time
turns absence into routine ache, winter’s
loneliness a trance from which I’m
surprised to wake. After the melting, reborn
earth trembles. I have no more reason
to stay inside, holding close my dead.
Let them travel up from somewhere low,
warming slowly through branched
channels of trees. After frozen times,
let me grow accustomed to joy.
Let me be terrified back to life.
Mike Bove is the author of four books of poetry, most recently EYE (Spuyten Duyvil, 2023). He serves as a 2024 Writer-in-Residence at Acadia National Park and is Associate Editor for Hole in the Head Review. Mike is Professor of English at Southern Maine Community College and lives with his family in Portland, Maine where he was born and raised. He can be found at www.mikebove.com