"Lamentation: School Bus in Morning"

They say this is normal, the calm
he had about leaving for kindergarten,
his desire to take the bus.
She saw his foot against the backdrop of the door,
and then only a vapor trail.

If the toilets hadn't run,
hadn't made gurgling sounds,
pressing against the crevices
of her innermost ear, she would be
wild with worry over the child,
her small child, his crayons
on the chair, his books
smelling of dusk and smoke.

The uneasy creaking of the empty
house--the inside,
black and crenellated, drawn out
like geese against the clouds,
the inside, new with emptiness,
comes out against the outside.

Instead, the toilet, and then
the fall rain. So much rain
she forgot about the child leaving,
about how like screaming
the rain came down.

--Margo Stever