WINTER BLANKET

The skid-steer bucket chatters
against the clay and decomposing 
granite baked like concrete, 
 
inching deeper into my mind 
to the great bay horse dressed pink 
and white with long-stemmed Centuary, 
 
scattered wild petals I covered 
with dirt—each shovelful a memory 
for over an hour.  Another hole
 
and granite headstone, we are surrounded
by the old and faithful we have survived—
another hole, hearts perforated
 
with each dear soul lost that now arrives
to attend this moment to make us whole.
Quick and painless after fourteen years
 
of alert devotion, I steal fine ground squirrel 
tailings smoothed for the ‘good dog Jack’—
a winter blanket to sow for flowers.