He Used to Ride Out and Dispossess His Tenants as the Spirit Moved Him

She tried to push love through
his skin, thin like an insomniac’s
two a.m., inject it into the tiny ridges
of wrinkles or will it through age
spots gathered like sad men in strip
clubs alone, breathe it into his mouth, save
him from death sleep, speaking
to bereft only he could
see, roll it like fog down his
thoroughbread thighs,
rinsing the rigidity from his
shins, injecting
opiates in his mortified
toes, but his body
always pushed it back
out, and no amount of her
cherishing
all
the
things
could stop the chill
that came
when her surrogate
heart stopped beating
for them
and he forgot
how to
love
at all.