Now at last the first snow falls
like a blanket upon dim powers.
Keep the fire alive now
and do not disturb the sleep
of roots and seeds...
The shining winter sky
is close enough to touch;
and you too are this sky.
No reason to distinguish.
For all the stars flow through your veins.
There's so much you want to say,
but time keeps taking time and all
your words away. How to say—amid
this flood of gratitude and grief—
"Thank you!", or "How beautiful,
how grand!", or "I don't know how
I survived", or "I miss you so," or
"I was changed forever the day
we two joined hands."
As you reach for your last words,
you realize this is it—this ebbing tide
of language called your life, words
trailing into silence, returning to
the source—this unfinished poem
you would have writ, had you not
been awash in wonder, grateful
to be living it.