Here is the pale shady tree
and here is Summer returned:
silken breath of sweet smooth heat
under the rippling boughs
and the trickling leaves…
But where are we?

The sky is just the same blue.
The sun, as hot, still stares,
cold into this pool-like world.
The grasses heave and sigh
with flowers floating
but you and I…

Promises have fled like months;
burnt in pyres of Autumn leaves –
the ashes tumbling in floods
or scattered, for the world
to mock, by the winds…
Ripped up like us.

I have walked this far and stop
to stand and gaze where once before
I never gazed. And where the haze
reflects abundant gifts –
the breeze dissolves pain
into new peace.

Here is the pale shady tree
and here is Summer returned:
silken breath of sweet smooth heat
under the rippling boughs
and the trickling leaves…
Let me pause here.

Copyright 2016 by Paula Harmon. All rights belong to the author and material may not be copied without the author’s express permission