January
        for Linda Gregg

Being a man, I was the least
among the shades
because of what I still carried.
I asked the caryatid to extend
her hand, but it was broken,
which is the way with stone.
There were several at the entrance,
but they were ornamental,
no longer load-bearing.
The dead would not have it.
The sun was sinking toward the rim,
I remember. I remember too
the poet said, it is more important
to walk across a field now
than to revisit the sorrows.

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Copyright © 2017 David Rigsbee All rights reserved
from This Much I Can Tell You
Black Lawrence Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission