A constant battle wages.
Not unlike the push of day and night,
of looming dark and present light,
the child fights the man.
Defying all that causes such transition,
he's holding tight his innocence,
like stream born stones aright withstanding waters push,
smoothed and shrunk by time.
All the while
experience ceaseless wrecks its rage
like pounding waves against the sand
abound in chorus rote.
Obstinate and still the child stands despite,
with every shard of will withstanding,
soon or late with scars withdrawing.
The birth-ed child swoons in Spring and green,
where all exists perpetual bloom;
A roses pedal never bends beyond its first unfolding,
ever newly curled and slightly closed.
The sun is dressed in constant dawning,
freshly pruned, skyward strewn and climbing.
Each the sparrow perched between the swells
of learn-ed song and unlearned flight.
He, the willful rock in April's welled and sightly stream,
is set alight and loosed by deft decision,
steadfast and stayed by choice-
each by will.
Age-ed Man resides beyond a constant dusk,
a winter's constant chill
where flowers bend to wilting
stilled upon the cusp of dying.
The sparrows song has long since ceased,
the last to wing has taken,
only echoes lone and far the meekest doves of mourning.
He the stream,
the crested wave bereft of choice or will,
forsaken cold and crashing, broken
aimless bound to shake
whatever deeps the tides will take.
Between the Spring and looming Winter
dwells at first the fruit of Summer's blooming.
Not the breadth of Eden,
but fruit forbidden still.
All its threads that start to weaving,
when woven etch a pattern lined with grief and deep decay;
Abundant sun indulged to overflowing,
days of endless length conceiving nights
where calm and rest go unrecieved, untaken.
Such a wealth of pulling pleasures,
such that beckon every child birthed.
Strong their pull,
weak the hand deceived that meekly rising first defies
and turning slow to soft submission full commits
ascending strong with winged desire.
As up the eager hand receives,
down descends a fragile will and thought.
Thus arrives the Autumn's deepened red,
the fated breath to bate the fall.
All that once was crafted full
in pieces carved and fine,
all that April loosed and raised to walking
stands upon the swell of dark descent,
deeply shaded just upon it's looming crest.
Each is hemmed and baited,
kept within it's bounds and swept
amidst the auburn dying.
What once resided all adorned in newborn jade
is dropping sure and slow as dusk upon the daytime,
not unlike the swell of night.
It's then the curling crashes,
forming full the fell and will-less Winter
where each the child first reluctant,
cold and scarred beholds the man,
his hands abreast and filled to overflowing.
The hand that once defied,
which once would nurse a sparrow lame to health
and lift it back to fill it's precious nest,
that now to take would be
a fowls wing to break.
With brush and eye
that once had beckoned beauty,
now arthritic, aged
its fingers late refuse the grip
of once it's glad and whetted brush.
A bird who's lost its flight,
the child's lost the sweet delight
to be the smallest speck
in beauties ever casting deep design.
But even in the depth of Winter,
though seeming crestless, endless,
still there keeps the faintest promise,
a far off hope of Spring.
Beneath the ground the soil sets to working,
far beneath the frozen shards of Winter's breaking
something left of life is waking.
While still the furried swells are crashing,
every smoothed and shrunken stone
amidst the wild white remains.
Between the rush of Winter's rage,
the quickened pull of each its tides,
they small and slow reside.
Withstanding Winter long- surviving not defying,
some arrive to walk the steps of Spring.
It's here,
here that man beholds the child,
child fills the man to overflowing,
welled with something so minute
yet vast beyond his understanding full;
Something vague remembered,
only flashes half believed and fading.
Not for all, perhaps for only few,
the time to grasp what long was lost,
a circle full,
the slow return to endless Spring's
perpetual blooming
all alight with sparrow songs
and constant dawning;
The sweet return of innocence.
