The Queen of the Crimson Pail

Before the dark comes-
and it always comes-
She chose the red pail.

Not the earth.
Not the shadow.
Not the quiet place
where feathers return to dust.

She chose height.
She chose color.
She chose the striped, spinning world
of one last, impossible brightness.

They say the dying
seek the familiar-
the nest, the soil,
the low and waiting ground.

But she-
She climbed.

As if to say:
I was here.
I stood on something bright.
The yellow light knew my name.

Her feathers, still warm
with the colors of a life
fully, foolishly lived-
copper, gold, and borrowed sun-
catch the last breath of evening.

She does not look down.

The dying never should.

There is a strange joy in this-
the standing,
the balancing,
the quiet, absurd dignity
of a soul perched
at the rim of everything,

tipping neither forward
nor back,

just present,
just breathing,
just here.

On a red-striped pail
in a pool of yellow grace,

she discovers, at the very edge,
that life
was always
more beautiful
than it was
long.

And when she finally steps off-
into whatever waits beyond
buckets and light-

She will go
not with lament,
But with the posture
of one
who stood
at the top of her small, shining world

and called it

enough.

Object number

011.087