When there’s a song in my head
where God should be,
I yearn for the ballet 
master, for winters
 
at the studio, where I 
was one of four cygnets. 
Rehearsals ran late. 
Night swayed on its green stem
 
and I couldn’t comprehend
we’d ever be clipped from it.
Even seeing us together
in our white tutus—
 
like roses standing naked
on a coffin—I was soothed
by the sound of rain
hissing through the leaves.