Mourning

There is fragile beauty in this:
Passing you in the hallway, tear-stained eyes meeting
Tear-stained eyes, lids swollen as a bruise,
Hair hung limp, limbs hung slack.
There is fragile beauty in this hello,
This passing in the hallway of two battered warships,
Hull cracked, mast splintered,
Scarlet sails hung flaccid against the tarnished deck.
There is fragile beauty in the way one slides past the other,
In the way the light of the sun does not so much illuminate
Your face as awakens it, warms polished wood
And frayed rope, a whisper of wind calling
All hands to deck, all sails set starboard.