March, 2020, in New York

On another day we toured the Hudson.

The boat passed a lighthouse

Stark in the waves, its tower brown

With home attached where someone

Breathed and lived and worked,

Worked even when sleeping because

The presence was the work, the guarantee

Of bright circling constancy

Lest a craft drift into rock

and home and island where the keeper

Kept vigil alone.

And what was solitude?

A charge.

A promise.

A daily task fulfilled.

And also a kettle whistling in the morning,

Toast beside a window,

A thing maintained and then, perhaps,

A novel or a tune on a guitar, or whistled,

Letters written,

Thoughts and dreams and prayers

On an island thirty foot square.

Has it been only six months?

On another day we toured the Hudson.

We must all be keepers, now.