| I. | New grass laughed under our feet, | |
| and warm fingers | ||
| twined lacework promises | ||
| one to one | ||
| while the greening trees threw a song of Eden | ||
| to the sky. | ||
| II. | This is the power | |
| of sadness | ||
| It is winter, my grief shaking rain | ||
| from a sullen sky, | ||
| and each splash hardens | ||
| in mudded ice | ||
| another weighted chill across | ||
| the pit of my remembrance. | ||
| It is darkness | ||
| piled wet and cloudward about me, | ||
| this, the work of your renunciations, | ||
| forbidding tomorrow. | ||
| And soon silence, | ||
| heavy silence, | ||
| where I yet in my pit | ||
| slosh among deep-etched regardings | ||
| and quiver | ||
| to the fading echo of your magic | ||
| incantations. | ||
| III. | I have made me | |
| a coat of thorns | ||
| and wrapped me about in wonder | ||
| that yet another warmth | ||
| may call, | ||
| that yet again I might know | ||
| laughter and twining. | ||
| B. A. Tupper | ||
| © 1993 |