Two survivors met on the street today.
Without even glancing up
one began telling in a rush how the leaves
had started to talk to each other again,
but they cut me out, don’t want me to know
what they’re saying, and I envy their
being so nearly alike, so easily nourished,
so definite. He was on his knees by this time
talking to the earth already, he was
incredibly wrinkled, unnaturally thin,
starving himself and barely aware
of the woman he had run into. Please,
he said, send me a large-toothed animal,
something to tear me away from this.