Wreckage

Within the graying frame

of that sad, old house

ravaged by that Northwest rain

stands a reliquary for our dead joy:

the remains of an old Yuletide tree, our tree

bare-limbed, heartwood gone to rot.

A nearby window, tired of the fight, gives up

its breaking glass trumpets a blast of wind;

a last, lone ornament, an orb of delicate crystal

drops from it s branch, falls straight and slow

and shatters in a rainbow cloud,

an unseen finale to a ruinous tale

of the quiet end of our lost love.