A poem by HARRY OWEN
Hear: there is an opening
Where rivers trickle, waters slow,
Forgotten, far-flung, fringing wood.
A slender isolation glows.
Within that grove ‘pon hill yonder
Hurried steps do seldom wander
While crickets click – and soft leaves sigh –
‘Mid the river-water flow.
And laid here once a girl and boy
Among the birds. Forty trees high
Closed in the shade. Relaxed, we stared
While sweet life’s humble dance skipped by.
Intrusion here would interfere,
Pollute the dream or pinch the pair
While cosmos in unconscious prime –
In the haze – swam unaware.
And when that boy as old as trees
Breathes his last – words bone, run dry –
Remains he unabated there
Through haze and shade forever where
Crickets click and soft leaves sigh.
Rain down on isolation, glowing:
A stubborn trickle (‘til the seas,)
Climax in an opening.
