Poem: Song of Departures

We all must have our song of departures

for when the long shadow down the road we’re on
coming from in front of us

catches up with us

and covers us like an amorous lover
from head to toe with sultry kisses

then we know we’re going where
all caps are worn backwards

and every window looks in rather than out
at the world

Pools reflect more than sky with clouds overhead
they also show our watery roots
and the purification of our desires for
One Beloved alone out of Whom

all others fan and into Whom all collapse back again
singing to us their own song of departures as they

slide into His Single Sovereignty after all

There’s a tree here
that would also like to beckon us goodbye

and it has rainbows around each leaf
and faces in the shadows of everyone we’ve

ever known but as it’s the tree of life it has for
each of us only faces each one of us

has truly known yet they’re all the same Face
and sing their own song of departure among the
leaves as they fall or as they blossom
each spin of the cycle we’re in

slowly saying goodbye to it all

so slowly at first we’re not saying goodbye
at all but hello and every

conversation in between

but each is a departure

and each is a song

9/18/2006
(from In the Realm of Neither, in preparation)