The Gatekeeper’s Children

You can tell because it’s taken all

The colors and left only the spaces

Between colors where the absence

Of rage and hunger survives. If you could

Get close you could touch the embers

Of red, the tiny beaks of yellow,

The color of heaven. Behind the house

The children digging in the flower beds

Have been out there since dawn waiting

To be called in for hot chocolate or tea

Or the remnants of meals. No one can see

Them, even though children are meant

To be seen, and these are good kids

Who go on working in silence.

They’re called the gatekeeper’s children,

Any gatekeeper, but if there were

These would be his, the seven of them,

Heads bowed, knifing the earth. Is that rain,

Snow, or what smearing their vision?

Remember, in the beginning they agreed

To accept a sky that answered nothing,

They agreed to lower their eyes, to accept

The gifts the hard ground hoarded.

Even though they were only children

They agreed to draw no more breath

Than fire requires and yet never to burn.