When you recall the time,
Perhaps long ago,
Perhaps only yesterday it ended,
When first you came to know yourself
And time distended,
When you recall the time
Impulse was your king,
When you alone had secrets and had wants,
World wide and never shallow since
Your baptismal font;
Do you recall how you felt time,
And thunder’s strikes unending?
Do you remember glints from scythes
And youthful hair descending?
Lone elm in bamboo grove
Dreamed not of the axe.
Its roots found earth and stones in equal part,
And, taught by some internal force
Turned dirt into art.
This dance hall will soon close.
You will take away
Nothing but memories of human pairs,
The human drama ‘wash with noise
Forms that flit through air.
Before you knew that others knew,
Or you knew yourself, when you
Were held in larger peoples’ arms –
Saw each vantage, every view
Mother, that quiet talk
Half-heard on the phone?
Suspecting she had secrets of her own.
Empathy first, then daughter saw
Something you weren’t shown.
Father, torchbearing son,
‘Let me fix it too.’
Replacement? But you always make them good.
No – they’re under strain. Quiet outside,
Chaos under hood.
When you recall that amber time
The scythe carved you from childhood,
Do not lament the marks it left.
The imperfections in the wood
Are the beautiful and the good.
verso folio 