by Mark Doty<\/p>\n
You weren’t well or really ill yet either;
\njust a little tired, your handsomeness
\ntinged by grief or anticipation, which brought
\nto your face a thoughtful, deepening grace.<\/p>\n
I didn’t for a moment doubt you were dead.
\nI knew that to be true still, even in the dream.
\nYou’d been out–at work maybe?–
\nhaving a good day, almost energetic.<\/p>\n
We seemed to be moving from some old house
\nwhere we’d lived, boxes everywhere, things
\nin disarray: that was the story of my dream,
\nbut even asleep I was shocked out of the narrative<\/p>\n
by your face, the physical fact of your face:
\ninches from mine, smooth-shaven, loving, alert.
\nWhy so difficult, remembering the actual look
\nof you? Without a photograph, without strain?<\/p>\n
So when I saw your unguarded, reliable face,
\nyour unmistakable gaze opening all the warmth
\nand clarity of you–warm brown tea–we held
\neach other for the time the dream allowed.<\/p>\n
Bless you. You came back, so I could see you
\nonce more, plainly, so I could rest against you
\nwithout thinking this happiness lessened anything,
\nwithout thinking you were alive again.<\/p>\n
–Read at St. Lydia’s on June 30 and July 1, 2013<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by Mark Doty You weren’t well or really ill yet either; just a little tired, your handsomeness tinged by grief or anticipation, which brought to your face a thoughtful, deepening grace. I didn’t for a moment doubt you were dead. I knew that to be true still, even in the dream. You’d been out–at work […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[9],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stlydiasliturgy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2427"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stlydiasliturgy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stlydiasliturgy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stlydiasliturgy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stlydiasliturgy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2427"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/stlydiasliturgy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2427\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2429,"href":"https:\/\/stlydiasliturgy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2427\/revisions\/2429"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stlydiasliturgy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stlydiasliturgy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2427"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stlydiasliturgy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}