The Wires of the Night

I have been thinking about this poem by Billy Collins. In the tangle of shifting imagery, I think he captures the repetition inherent in the process of grief. The minute but incoherent details give the sense that one is caught on the sharp barbs of introspection. Or perhaps it shows that once you think you have a handle on what loss means, it means more, and takes another shape. And then at the end... after a long hard night wrestling with death, the narrator awakens to the fact that this loss will go with him into the future. I thought about looking for a poem that was less dark this year, as I have felt less pain, and more peace. And through it all there has been been that firm foundation of my faith in God even when I discovered that grief was "a floor/ you could not lie down on in the middle of the night." I'm not quite sure how to wrap this up, so I think I'll leave it there.