Light
for Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Remember this woman
Unbowed, unafraid, and unbroken.
There will never be another.
Her spirit is a rising light.
Break free, Light, soar like never before.
Amass all your energy, leave behind only the shimmers of yourself
Dancing in the gray, plaited bark
Enmeshed in the ground. You gave us time and wisdom, more than enough. The hour has come to transcend the darkness, leave this earth, and
Rip open your path to the sky.
Grief. Grief is all we know now.
In this huddle of grief, we claw for your warmth
Near the end of our hope, we watch your light rise farther and farther away from our wet eyes, watch it
Swell into the night, as strong and
Blinding as a winter sun.
Under a black iris sky, you deliver one last song, a soft aria in the wind.
Ruth, speak
Give us light one more time, teach us one more time how not to be scared, tell us how to stay whole on this cold earth, inside spirits mangled by loss and by the dark, the unrelenting dark, where we shudder with bruised hearts, groping for faith and praying for the dawn.
Stacy Torian 