an encouragement for an 'ole friend' I recently bumped into...

“Some things you’ve known all your life.
They are simple and true
They must be said without elegance, meter and rhyme,
They must be laid on the table beside the salt-shaker,
The glass of water, the absence of light gathering
In the shadows of picture frames, they must be
Naked and alone, they must stand for themselves.”
Phillip Levine - ‘The Simple Truth’

He was someone
Who at one time fathered
Such grace and seemliness,
Whose (once) generously edifying
Words stagger now only in the gray’s
Of riddles and do’s and don’ts;
Have the war years, and fears of dying,
Begun isolated you from your stimulants?
What’s happened to u ole friend?
Getting old
Is an act of grace.
Being old shouldn’t distress
Anymore than a snowy moon’s luminance
As it pirouettes with swaying trees...
Senescent or not, heavens rains
Will still refresh,
And moistened rich soil
Will yield its musty fragrance
As flowers blossom and smile and fade
In a relentless passing of seasons;
You, too, are a flower (in season)
Ole friend…
In spite of your fears and
The years weighing heavily on you,
Mockingbirds still delight, in the higher branches,
With their colorful fire of conjurations,
Even as winters snow deepens and
As a heart strains through
Memories portion of impermanence…
The intensely aching beauty
You see being just within your grasp
Has a heat that burns when you reach for it.
Whether it’s
Yours or not is NOT
In your power to understand;

Don’t quit reaching…



richard lloyd cederberg