Garage Sale

I sold her bed for a song.
A song of yearning like an orphan’s.
Or the one knives carve into bread.

But the un-broken bread
song too. For the song that rivers
sing to the ferryman’s oars. With

that dread in it.
For a threadbare tune: garroted,
chest-choked, cheap. A sparrow’s,

beggar’s, a foghorn’s call.
For the kind of song only morning
can slap on love-stained sheets —

that’s what I sold my mother’s
bed for. The one she died in. Sold it
for a song.