Patterns

(dedicated to Eva Cassidy and Daniel Malkin)

 

There were two of you at the hospital
Both thirty-three
Both musicians
Both with melanoma

 

Eva told you

"No one's voice comforts like yours"

It made you weep
To help

You who'd just lost a hip and
Part of your back
Who could not bend
To tie your shoes

 

Eva came into the world
Three months before you
She left the world
Three months before you

 

You dragged yourself
To her funeral
And mourned
"For myself," you said

 

You showed me a photo of

Blonde, blue-eyed Eva

Played a tape of her singing jazz

Her voice soaring in the same exultation

I heard in your cello playing

 

Now both of you are gone
And in this silence,

I am left
Seeking patterns
Hints of meaning
For such terrible loss