I See Your Life Come Shining

upon the death of my father

I cast into the ether
this borrowed bit of time
so that I may spirit
an opening line

that sways
words I choose not to say about death
loose from the barnacles
under the deep ship of my heart
in the still water of the unspoken

it is dark among the secrets
and I cast into the night

I am alone
and I await
the dawn
that no longer saves me

I tremble in the final hope
that you are beyond the fright
now freezing me

and I cast once more
into the hardening doom

and a summer light
streams across the gloom

and shimmers upon the grace of your swim

the smooth arc of your arms
and flash of your back
a flying fish
impossible to catch

you employ a liquid joy
and laugh as you break the water

and I promise you that in the cold

we skate the ice and ski the snow

to share a bewitching winter dance
that celebrates
the states of matter

that connects our love
to all that falls before
and to all that falls after

November 1995