Grief Redecorated Your House

This I will say for grief. It made everything new.

Were you tired of your clothing? Wished for

a new suit or blouse?  How

can you wear a new blouse

in the presence of grief?

A new blue blouse.

How could you? How

could you even care

what color?  Were you bored

with your furniture, of living

with the same sofa year after year. Grief

redecorated your house

with outrage.  Nothing

was the same, not the paint

on the walls, not the walls themselves

not the atoms holding up the walls

in all that empty space.

This poem appeared in The Briar Cliff Review, vol. 20 (2008).