Upon opening The Way It Is after a week that convinces me that this dark marathon is much longer than I expected, even in my most hardened moments

Wake up my soul,
I ask, please.

It lies sleeping somewhere
under a pile of emails,

Congressional edicts,
cruel comprehensions,

that I have been picking through
all week.

And now that it is Saturday,
I am quite sure
it will never see the light of day again.

Fetch it for me, will you?
Rouse it up.
Help it fly back to me.

Then you and I
can still have this —
small, true,
but unending, generous.