The first law of physics states  

Energy is  

neither created  

nor destroyed

only transformed.  

Probably I misunderstand, as I do most  

science, this fundamental concept.

It seems to come down  

to what we learn from absence:  

How those fallen leaves decay

enriching the soil, feeding the roots

of the tree that will make new buds;  

how that maverick river crashes down

with a force, a potential energy  

that is harnessed from turbine  

to generator to alternating current

to flow through filaments into light;  

how the very air drinks of the river

and my skin to form fat heavy clouds

of steam and rain and sleet, liquid  

to vapor to solid to liquid to vapor,  

an enduring cycle. It might seem  

that tree once felled, split and burned,

its dense matter consumed by flame,

released as heat  

no longer exists.  

Yet ash remains  

nourishing soil pounded from stones.    

I use these alterations  

about me to determine  

death is not a condition

but an event between states:

The brief flame between wood and ash.  

An evaporation between cloud and rain.

A violent churning from river to electricity.  

Truth or no, the notion empowers me  

to churn grief into heat  

to replace yours, into light  

by which to examine my soul,  

into an engine to carry me back to us.  

By Shelly Norris

From: United States

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