POEM ~ Bathing In The Lethe

BATHING IN THE LETHE

The morning after mourning
late winter

was shaded with autumn

something more than seasons was awry

as though a door

had been knocked off its hinges

yet this seemed

just so

not grim, not odd

as if I were being placed

with aesthetic deliberation upon a windowsill

to catch the last rays of dusk

all sorts of reasonings

could now be put aside

sealed in parcel tape

and delivered up to the attic

neither feeling bereft

loved nor unloved

but in unhappy release

that put an end and made a new start

all childish rebellions could finally be quelled

all tedium in the teeth of declension

could yawn its last and turn over

all self-righteous torch bearing

could now find

its appropriate level

for ridicule and redundancy

having learnt whilst waiting
in the long shadows of

bereavement

what it is

to bury a hatchet

in the slow sombre snaking

of a much deeper river.

Vidyavajra 2012