To Gil
Nicholas Martino

Tell me the story again—how you crashed a buddy’s car
on your 21st birthday, lush on brandy and shake—

while I clear the plates from the table
and put the house to bed.

When you finish, flick the embering day from your fingers
and go play guitar in the stable. I’ll go too, and watch the horses

in pasture over the horizon of your shoulder,
knitting the new moon between thumb and forefinger.

Tell me again how now is the time of the season to plant cassava.
I’ll bury bulbs between my branches of November sky. Tell me again, Gil,

you solitary band of light, and you will never die.

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