The World

I wanted so ably to reassure you, I wanted the man you took to be me, to comfort you, and got up, and went to the window, pushed back, as you asked me to, the curtain, to see the outline of the trees in the night outside. The light, love, the light we felt then, grayly, was it, that came in, on us, not merely my hands or yours, or a wetness so comfortable, but in the dark then as you slept, the gray figure came so close and leaned over, between us, as you slept, restless, and my own face had to see it, and be seen by it, the man it was, your gray lost tired bewildered brother, unused, untaken - hated by love, and dead, but not dead, for an instant, saw me, myself the intruder, as he was not. I tried to say, it is all right, she is happy, you are no longer needed. I said, he is dead, and he went as you shifted and woke, at first afraid, then knew by my own knowing what had happened - and the light then of the sun coming for another morning in the world.