When Love Leaves The Light (revision of The Picture I Did Not Take)

When Love Leaves The Light

I wanted to take a picture of them,
two white heads so close to one another,

his long, pale neck--slender as a swan's--
turned toward hers, toward the light; she

there in the chair next to his bed, softly
speaking his name, her speckled hand

on his bruised and swollen arm, these two
the most delicate, yet strongest of the late

summer blossoms, leaning toward one
another, toward the light, nearing dawn,

her eyelids closing like the moonflower
in the morning sun; death enveloping them

like the morning fog. I had planned to bring
my camera to the hospital that morning, back

to the large corner room where his sons
and wife kept vigil, his breathing labored,

the hiss of the oxygen the only sound
for minutes at a time, but life had other

plans, and death entered the room
as I waited for the southbound to clear

the tracks, brought with it rays of sun
and all of the illuminated tiny particles

of matter shone around them, and filled
the space as death bid adieu with his treasure,

and left the living to the details of living, mercy
and grief bobbing along in his bountiful wake.