Yevtushenko In Heaven Was Said To Have Said

yevtushenko in heaven was said to have said
it's the beginning not the end of colours as we knew them
and Anne Frank here, here where it is always April I commend

so many old friends with halos
please tell my students this is what I meant
all this

but here the vision fades...
and we are left to ponder in the afternoons
what is the life of poets after their doom is unsealed

and forgotten by God, the seventh angel or the eighth...
they no longer tread the earth;
their poems float pinkward, home.

mary angela douglas 6 january 2019