After Loss

Printer-friendly versionJohn J. Savant

In the middle of God’s will
where you find yourself when
the mind has lost its map and
your memory has come down to

hunger: let your hand drift
into the colorless stream; let
your heart cease trying to make
a neat room of the minute; let

nothing but a single fly enter
that room, his impatient wings
grow still and grow stiller; let
him cease altogether—Nothing

enters this room now that is not
your life. Nothing defines it. You
are more light than matter. You
round like a sun. You are so grateful.

John Savant is emeritus professor of English at Dominican College, San Rafael, Calif. His essays are collected in Out of Anger, Out of Love (Paxavant Publishing, 2005).

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