An Ordered Name

I attempted to stay at the desk all day;
an old dog rattling through a young
dog's day. The season was heaping
the wet leaves there, and Benedict

still and unhoused, in clay, without
the wood cross that will carry his names:
natus, professus, obitus, clay.
His cross with its beaten tin roof. Its slow,

wet tales of a turning decay. Aubrietia, and
hostas; where Jack changed to Jack, and James
to Sylvanus, and David to Barnabus; as
the tyrant wind pulled the fuchsia each way.