by Donna Hilbert

Before the spill of stars
the shatter, scatter
across the hemispheres
before the tremble, tremor
before the Grand quake
when astrocyte was a word
not a word made flesh,
she wakens to the stir
of wings rustling, settling
at the foot of her bed.
The angel sits with her
for seven nights.
His country-doctor gaze
is a beam of light, comforting

her as a father comforts
his dream-tossed child.
She is lonesome when he goes.
In his backward glance
her world ignites, explodes.