Laurie Soriano		Spring   Leaves are whispering down, my people shipping out in moving vans and caskets. My fingers are listless against the white sky as the rain begins, and birds fly twirling and laughing from wire to steely twig.   The earth has tipped, some I loved fell off and some rolled elsewhere. As the moving trucks trembled to go forward, we kissed briefly, our bodies separate, and leaned our heads back to keep the tears from spilling.  I have learned the stolid set of my face when unobserved when I am gazing off beyond the distance.   The trees revel in the sky stark but radiant, shaking off the last of the rain as a child cries off in the distance   and I go inside and up the stairs to comfort him. As he slackens with sleep, my own murmurs melt me, my warm fingers on his forehead, and his unburdened breathing, and leaves are sprouting.		Looking Back   If we leave the windows open, we can hear the sound of the Pacific crashing every night.  In the summers, we are serenaded by sea lions— a song of lust and dominion ringing out among the dim rocks.   We have come to a screeching halt at the edge of the continent, like cartoon characters clinging to the edge of a cliff with bare feet. We ache for shuttling further, for the oblivion of the new.   A trail of tears leads back across the land to the vigorous Atlantic, a trail we need to follow to make our peace at gravesites, to celebrate the anguished earth, to piece back together with tender hands all that we have broken.