To shred them: a narrow labor, and simply toss
The pieces away like peelings. Fingers tear
The heavier sheets across, across, across,
In voluptuous bravery; so children pare
Skin from a wound half-healed, admiring loss.

A phrase, like a deep look, glows from this pale
Manila paper: now flurrying, as past clutch
As confetti for the street sweeper to nail.
The word that a moment since was to behold, to touch,
Collapses into an impalpable Braille.

Postcards resist squarely, stiff to defeat
The redoubled twitch would slice them like a knife;
As if each public view — park, river, or street —
Were alive and clinging to its private life:
All that the eyes have loved returning in retreat.

What’s left then? Mincings like receipted bills.
Those lines where the ink throbbed like an artery,
So littled, would not serve a fire by way of spills.
Yet in the widowing wrist the pulse more stubbornly
Beats: the heart swears: memory salutes, and kills.