Autumn Creates Space For Dying

Autumn creates space for dying.
What is left untended in the heat of summer
needs mending in the fall.
For earth and flesh must keep their seasons
and their liturgy.

The leaves fall, fall, dried and withered things
as if from some far and distant land.
Through their barren pathways up and down I wander,
unmasking hidden gardens of my past.
O, how long my road has been.

Down, down, into the emptiness 
that solitude has cast.
Where memories’ wavering echo
relives the residue of suffering,
and the gray fog of sorrow drifts.
Where what is near seems far away,
a painless vastness among the stars. 

Up, up, I slowly climb to heights
where long lamenting shadows 
lay lonesome across the mountain stone.
And in the quiet stillness a melancholy roams.
Where way beyond the distant ridge I see a city white.
There the radiant face of Christ appears.
and it was wet with tears.

Autumn creates space for dying
and a broken heart for crying.

BWS