McAuliffe, McAuliffe

I felt his friendship with McAuliffe die
Through him.
Through him and out of him,
Off of him, emanating from him like light.
Like steam. Like the boiling of bones.

McAuliffe, McAuliffe
On a mountain.
Splayed across a mountain in his soreness.

This young man
Who had been his closest friend
From what I’d heard,
Hugged me and I felt the death he returned to
over and over in his sleep.
It flaked off of him like plaster.

Trees had been stripped that morning
Of leaves,
And the ground was littered in sticks.

McAuliffe, McAuliffe
On a mountain.
Remembering the name spoken in a feast of trees.
Dried up leaves above our broken heads,

Echoing,
Calling back a spent blast
The crack of wasted fuel,
Burnt in the earthen birthing process.

Dead face of the dead young man,
He was on his way to a lovely transformation.
A mask had been applied
Then,
And could not be uncemented from his flattened face.

It occurred to me that a flood of thoughts ought to be arriving,
But, really, there was nothing.
There did not seem to be anything particularly brave about it.
Only softness and gold reincarnate remained.

Blue eyelids filled his coffin,
Powdered wax collected on our surfaces like
Oak leaves cold after a fire,
Like autumn arriving and staying for a while.
Like the stillness in a glass of water.

I did not know him well
And I did not know his friends.

Still, I found out in their sadnesses.
It occurred in the unvast space between us.

I was drawn to the
Center of things
Where their collection of feelings had huddled like
Rain at a water drain.

Shined his unending wish not to die,
And for me not to die.

McAuliffe, McAuliffe
On a mountain,
Spread on the upward face.