SAID THE WIDOW TO THE NIGHT I have cried to the night so loud That I have left a man to his grave And not one more kiss I had To ease the lonely journey as I myself wait to die In the kitchen where I spend my days with elbows furrowed in grooves Upon the wood I watch life as I knew it with him And now a stranger to the world, I be With the birds above signalling the height to which I shall rise Upon my window sill I have flora bright My family have long since passed Those days were long But none as sore as my own decline To recall his hand on mine is all too familiar an ache For his hands are now in soil Reaching up to mine from the very land he walked My voice an echo, my tears a puddle, a grave I am to find Said the widow to the night. -- Deirdre Morris, "Creative Rhymes," Dublin's poets and writers magazine