Descent

Even before the cold winds set in, the trees are alive with flames
Fluttering, falling, a litter of star-fire across the last
Of the green grass. Summer has passed over the waters
And into the West, unnoticed, while I brooded over things
Beyond my control. How many summers have slipped away,
Sly as secrets towards unseen horizons from which they cannot
Be recalled?

The Old Woman is at the door, and me coatless on the threshold.
No hat or muffler will shield me from her breath, her icy hands.
Soon her howling will fill my ears. Eyes fill, throat closes.
I am closed as any bud, shrouded in darkness, waiting,
Waiting for the first rays of light to pentrate the deeps. Will I see
Them this year? Will I feel their feather-light touch here,
In the Mother's womb?

Raison d'Etre

Somehow, consternation and frustration got control, wresting from me
The beauty of the enchanted landscape, the beauty of the ancestral bequest
Given freely. Somehow I forgot that present woes are not
Everything. There, at Perceval's Gate, I was drowning in anger,
A trout thrashing on the shore, heedless of decorum.

I was a mad actor then, pleading to a deaf stage manager for an exit.

Then I awoke, as we often do, to see myself with foreign eyes, hear
With bemusement my own strangled cries. I am no Singer
To enchant those standing around the grave. If I lead them there,
How am I to deliver them again to the light of day? My wailing
Only feeds the darkness I rail against. I know this.

Time to come away, to make instead a place where mirrors flatter
And no one goes hungry into the night. Out there,
The madness waits patiently. Do not open the door
Or we are all lost! In here, we remember.
The reasons open themselves, scent the air, whispering:

The waylaid need no reminding of the quality of darkness.

And so the bin is full and the words are empty. Let complaint be
Beggared here. In this place, beauty and meaning prevail. I am making
A study of snowdrops, hellebore, crocuses, whose delicate blossoms appear
In the deeps of winter. I am making a study of change and the pains
We seek willingly. I remember. I breathe. I move--

Like you, I am a study in change.