Tom Sexton

On the Death of Seamus Heaney

He is crossing those four green fields now.
On the horizon, blossoms falling like snow.
A chorus calls his name. He does not break stride
toward a small house. He can hear his mother’s sigh.
Now he eyes his father holding a tall ladder
and at the top of the ladder stands his brother
skimming the gable, shaping the letters S.H.
in wet plaster. It covers his hands and knees
as blood did on the day he died. They turn
to go inside where his mother is churning butter.

“On the Death of Seamus Heaney” from A Ladder of Cranes by Tom Sexton, copyright© 2015. Reprinted by permission of University of Alaska Press, Fairbanks. All rights reserved.