Embers
spark of life
renews within the valley
Enveloped
in the warm stone
of canyon walls
Emerging
as if from the womb
new life partum
Embraced
by the Earth
matron of time and being
Evermore
the cycle plays and plays again
birth, life, death, rebirth
Given just a day
We arrive
With howling glory
Our sun waxes
Then wanes
And in the end
Extinguished
Though in the final moments
Perhaps an opportunity
To reprise the beauty
That was and is
The magical light
Of our manifestation
What’s left behind
On this near side of eternity
Shell of existence
Shadow legacy
Husk of memories kept alive
By those who’d known the shell
But never the true nature
Of what it protected
Too the trails
Footfalls left in the sand
Evidence of passing presence
Echoes oft anonymous
No matter all this
Tides soon enough erase
While echoes fade
To silence
So cling to hope
For something beyond
The far side of death
Or suffer the fear of oblivion
In the failing glow of sunset
She sidles up to precipice edge
Peers into deep shadows
Senses gravity
Emanating from the abyss
Steels herself
Resists anxiety
But resistance
Is anxiety
Breathe
Breathe
Breathe
Seeking peace
With the imminence
Of eternity
Despite the ways
My eyes can see
My ears can hear
My fingers feel
My tongue can taste
My nose knows scents
The world I sense
Is incomplete
And even with our cleverness
The tools we build
Extend each sense
Take me beyond
Known boundaries
The world I roam
Is but a part
To this I add
Imaginings
My wildest dreams
Absurd theories
Draw with words and pix
Artistic renderings
And yet
What mind and heart creates
Is in some sense
Quite finite
(I’ll reach my end
In time and space)
While the possible
Is infinite
Perhaps some day
I’ll spend my last
And come to know
What comes beyond
Then grasp at last
What it all means
Become myself
The infinite
This the golden hour
In advance of sun’s eclipse
I am with you
Hand in hand
Follow every laboured breath
A life of laughter, love and kindness shared
With wordless gaze and poignant smile
A tear
A sigh
A tightened grasp
Then return to fitful rest
A slumber which will last the night
But I’ll be here when you awake
In golden hour
Your hand I’ll take
Until at last
Your sun may set
He was there
Then not
All in the space
Of a few final breaths
Now a ghost
Whose laugh is lost
But to memory
And longing
Gone twenty five years
In this time of cheer
And on this day
Am I reminded
A twinkle in the eye
Said more
Than words, sometimes said
Had ever said
I love you, son
Under a blood red sky
A metaphor
A cliché
I cannot resist
Blood red it is
And so too
This life journey
Heart broken
Love rent
By the loss of one
towers and citadels
ramparts and parapets
fortress on the hillside
set afire in the morning sun
battles fought
war rages on
death visits here
still more to come
one strong heart
with will of stone
resolve of iron
but moments late
her final breath
his broken cry
their eyes now glazed
with death and grief
reign of tears
a rain of years
for one still form
her light now passing
towers and citadels
ramparts and parapets
fortress on the hillside
with darkness do the losses come
time withers
all good hope
but for love’s
illuminance
five hundred years
lives pass along
’til one strong heart
revived by dreams
a love once lost
was born anew
he holds the hand
of one once dead
knows the heart
which then fell still
now beats again
in true love’s breast
time’s never still
nor linear
where once was love
love’s never lost
towers and citadels
ramparts and parapets
fortress on the hillside
rememb’ring love can’t be undone
Pix to Words 