Sometimes the best beginning
is an ending.
Where a road stops at a precipice.
Where there is nothing but ashes
and the unmarred picture
of a child and a blackened ring.
An empty web at the end of autumn.
So the widow putting away
the possessions of a spouse,
wondering what use the years ahead
without the center of her soul.
Winter comes on like that,
when all the leaves are gone.
It is not the end,
but the hard time ahead
too dark to stir or bear.
The story is not complete.
Spring will come by one day
and kiss her face,
bittersweet with warmth.
And her heart will break
all over again,
and she will stare at herself in windows,
and refuse to return home,
but walk the streets,
until the ceremony of her love can pass,
and the unconscious sky
reach to her
and ask for her heart,
and fortunate perhaps,
Hope is kindled!
Her thirst returns,
and who knows?
What will come her way tomorrow?
I know such a one.