before she leaves she climbs a table

when she sat to type

a two-week message

sentences clattered like

bookshelves dominoed upon the marble

fingers shook and thoughts

garbled

(high away the planets do their sympathetic

turn on browning maps)

earlier

she went up

to a study table tucked in stacks

of ruddy-barked spines

the impulse too strong

to perch upon the table edge

and rise, the ridges of octavo rows

dappled by quarto doves

as along cathedral spires

or flower of forest top

in florescent leaves of sun

an armada

broadsides shuttered

coming finally to port

ovation of order

silent nods feathered in dust

each as if

to say

we cannot all

be opened now

however much we must.