'As Imperceptibly as Grief'

 

 

 

Larry Welo

 

 As imperceptibly as Grief
The Summer lapsed away—
Too imperceptible at last
To seem like Perfidy—
A Quietness distilled
As Twilight long begun,
Or Nature spending with herself
Sequestered Afternoon—
The Dusk drew earlier in—
The Morning foreign shone—
A courteous, yet harrowing Grace,
As Guest, that would be gone—
And thus, without a Wing
Or service of a Keel
Our Summer made her light escape
Into the Beautiful. 

 

Emily Dickinson 

 

Dickinson has a way of putting everything in a poem

 without making it heavy.

A sadness without wallowing. A lightness without taking lightly.

And that "our Summer" - I see how one word changes everything.

Are the passing seasons of my life an "escape into the Beautiful"?

Or do I look back with regret at what is gone?

Into the Beautiful - !

That's where I want to go.

                                                          

 

 

 

Woods

 

 

 

Gina Signore

Woods

 

I part the out thrusting branches
and come in beneath
the blessed and the blessing trees.
Though I am silent
there is singing around me.
Though I am dark
there is vision around me.
Though I am heavy
there is flight around me. 

 

Wendell Berry 

Silence, darkness, heaviness.

Singing, vision, flight. 

There is an exchange here that is extraordinary.

 

How much does nature influence our being?

The movement and sound and light - these change us.

I don't know how, but they do.