NOW IN JULY’S END
We know the weather will change,
along with everything else,
but how can we do justice
and give thanks and praise
for a thing handed to us so freely,
but then taken away, it seems,
when the weather changes
the construct of everything around
Felt by the colors of autumn,
altering the life of birds and
changing all that surrounds us,
transforming its immortal dress,
while our life, always in limbo,
takes us onward through its many turns
toward old age, that wanders with us
toward its inevitable end —
That we are not allowed to see,
nor even to imagine our own demise,
for Nature does not judge us,
as we must not judge our death,
but gird our loins and the lion within
for whatever comes next
Having but the illusion that comes
from self-importance
that thinks it can know. And that is
the illusion that holds us here, helpless
participants in a drama invisibly written,
to be acted if possible, intentionally,
in a complete surrender that is
there hiding somewhere within,
that will appear whether we are able
to see it in that instant or not.