Quiet water, so still water,
evanescent pond.
Play of light upon the surface,
promising beyond.

Share your breath with silent evening
as it glides the shining scene;
projected tree-perspectives
limn the corners of the screen.

So darkness twists the senses
and it robs the breath of air,
draws the waters all together
and embraces its despair.

There’s a lateness in the hour.
(Has it always been this way?
Have we always been so old?)

Take a stone, just any stone,
a little pebble marked,
hold it out across the surface
of all-penetrating dark.

You see your face reflected there,
(though lower down by miles)
in the distant patient surface
that you hope returns your smiles.

Drop the stone (just any stone)
and watch it close the gap,
like a scribbled-over paper,
simply landed in your lap.

(Was that a bell?
What is the time?)
Feel the air, rushing, rushing!

Now see it hit without a sound,
or nothing ears can grasp;
imagine, then, a pounding heart
or a pleased but furtive gasp.

But though the ears can’t hear a thing,
through shadow spy the sight
of a thousand circles swelling up
and shimmering with light.

Spreading from the center
(though only you can see)
the ripples catch their share of light
and spread across the sea.

“It starts in peace and runs through pain
and ever back and round again.”

The sun that rises shines for you,
in all you say and all you do.
And if it shines in winter’s cold,
there’s wisdom yet in growing old.

A moment
is a moment
is eternity
is now
is gone
is lost
is found
is waiting
and ever more shall be.

She bottles the hours, and saves them.
See them on the shelves,
beside the seashells.
“This is for sunshine,
this for rain.”
Breathe her perfumed hours,
the sea spray and foam.
I forget the time.

The tide is rising,
close to touch.

They walk in mists,
and do not see.
For all their light,
they do not see.
“We have our little secrets, sweet.”
Distant thunder,
and gray clouds.

And the sunset?
The moon, for you.

Empty vapors,
solid emptiness,
a million shining strands.
“Midnight is for dreaming.”
Scent of hours lost to thought;
she breathes and remembers.
The rising falling waves sound
of empires, cities, and lives…
Sweetness of dreaming,
another innocence.

And in the morning…

It shines for you.