SOLITUDE

The power of grief is for the living
The dead feel no grief
Who we wish to meet again
Is a living wish
The dead have no such longing
to regroup on the banks
of Jordan or Styx
to harbor the unforgetting
what calls without sound
beyond the boundary of existence
lost brother
lost father
lost mother
lost wife
Are not lost to themselves
But to us
who live their absence
who live their presence
as other and self
too close to be reconciled
containers of grief
that waters the tree
at the center
of the world
without which there'd be
no life
no grief
no longing for release
no movement beyond longing
children who bless us
before they go away...

        Paul Pines