|
Two Sestina
Crossroads
I'm at a bittersweet
crossroads in time,
A rose horizon, summer turning fall.
All innocence of nature thrives on love,
Yet what is ripe must too soon lose its hold;
And when likewise shall I in fading light
Make my final descent into the night?
For in the secret sweetness of the night
My heart has journeyed far 'cross space and time,
A gypsy moth attracted to sweet light,
Reached untold heights of wonder, then free-fall
Forever, as with music taken hold
By rapture's rhapsody of endless love.
But summer glories innocent in love
While many streak-red sunsets slip to night,
Till soon the ripened fullness cannot hold;
So to the unrelenting troubler, time,
The picture-perfect solstice-world must fall,
Toward humbling numb December's slanted light.
Now wistful in September's blue twilight,
I see the coming cold the price of love;
But winter's chill can't change the splendid fall!
I'll say I've had my day when comes the night,
And turn with tear-bright eyes to Father Time,
Extend my hand, eternity to hold.
For there is nothing greater to behold
Than ever-vernal heav'n-eternal light,
A glimpse of which I'm blessed with, for a time
In this unlikely life, an angel's love
When I was blind: "You'll make it through this night;
Just look my way, I'll never let you fall."
I know the glow, and it shall show, this fall!
Through winter, and beyond, nothing shall hold
This love in chains, no forces of the night
Shall lay claim to this tender sweet delight.
This crossroads, there is only one road: love,
Where angels travel with us, all the time.
I see it clearly now: fall is the time
For growing love, to share and bring more light,
To hold us closely through long winter's night.
A Swan Song's Coda
(Duckling's Dance)
The heart, obscured in
occidental mist,
Let show in glancing smile its golden state
Of sweet decision, turning from its place
Of safety, wireless wonder-message sent
To eyes enchanted, gateway to a mind
No less obscured, and equally entwined.
The danger of existing elf-entwined
In fleeting fantasy is what is missed
By not sustaining starlight—do you mind?
At sunrise dies the dream, that liquid state
Of inky bliss. Where are you? Have you sent
A swan song's coda, fade-out taking place?
At bay straight way, how many fools would place
Their hearts in jeopardy, at risk, entwined
In softly smiling signals sweetly sent?
Do wise men know the mystery of mist?
In whispered words we hear the sages state
The secret: that the heart-ace trumps the mind,
How sparkle-eyed enchantment haunts the mind,
A tender-kissed contender to replace
All reason with a love-enlightened state.
No wonder, then, how easily entwined
Are hearts in hopes of holding what is missed
When dreams so sweet and dear to death are sent.
This garden stroll in ever-sweeter scent
Seductively intoxicates the mind.
It revels in the pleasure of the mist,
A quiet fact; yet there's an end, a place
Beyond which strollers are no longer wined,
Awakened to a sadly sober state—
Repeat and fade, last bars!—a sorry state
Of such affairs. But with each coda's sent
A new and different tune: freedom entwined
With chance, a duckling's dance, and I don't mind!
How sweet to savor each note in its place
Until my swan-song fade within the mist:
For out of misty thoughts, words scarcely state
The truths of time and place, the heaven-sent
Delight and pain of heart and mind entwined.
|
