Springs Aren’t the Same

You will weep, or we’ll know why.
Death is not the source of grief;
Words are, as life is the source

Of the pain. The springs are not
The same. Grief is not a spring
At all, it is the Monks’ Bridge

On Man, each word a round stone
Fetched from the bed of the stream
That falls from the springs of names.

You can use that bridge to cross
From your own loss to the loss
That first broke you as a kid

And breaks you next, on your own
In your fine, gold world gone wan,
Ghost on your own as you go.