In Salem, N.Y., a long time ago,

centuries ago,

it was recorded in an old farm journal, that I

bought for a quarter out of an antique dealer’s basket,

that Sylvia, age nine,

headed towards the old pond

to find her stray dog Ginger,

and did not return.

“Syl is lost,” wrote the farmer on the first day,

“Not found,” he wrote on the second and third and fourth.

For seven days a search was made,

the brush and stalks were trampled,

men stomped through the darkness and the wet,

they saw her track leading to the pond,

but they did not find her,

and she did not return.

I’m sorry for the father and his grief, and sorry for the mother,

who was not consolable.

I’m sorry for grief, whose mark is everywhere.

Sometimes, loss leans like a broken stem,

I like to imagine that Sylvia

did it for all of us.