For an Autumn Wedding
All is prepared.
The slow white wedding-march of clouds, Sweeping the late leaves with skirts of rain, Have spread you a bright carpet in celebration. See, as you come, Golden slippers of sun run in the woodland, Lighting candles amidst the vaulting shade To make you a church of many aisles and altars. Listen together; The wind’s fine fingers fly on the organ. There are bells in the birds’ full throats for you, The leaves fall to their own gentle music. Their light kiss Upon your hair is of life and death; they speak With the ancient forest voice whose wisdom flows In root and seed, fed by the grey rain. Listen, and learn; How the brown earth, laced with a veil of leaves, Makes many weddings; death is a season’s sleep, Life a recurring dream from that rich bed. You are consumed Like leaves, gold in your every changing season, Dancing through lives and deaths, an immortal vein Of past selves ripening in the dark To nurture spring. |