She is coming home now,
her eyes though are looking back
at the bed where he has been
these last few days, gathering
the last of his strength for
the crossing he knows he must make,
alone;
she has tears in her eyes.
He was a long way from home,
without a cake or a candle,
down on the highway alone.
He heard the wind whisper
an ache of a familiar tune,
caught a silver shaft of moon.
He gave away the smile
and it got passed from face to face,
became the fuel for another mile
walked in the shoes of a stranger
looking for a better place.
In the midst of sadness
we play the songs we know
and move with familiar steps
across the dance floor;
and at the edge
of these known things
we free-fall into the unfamiliar,
into the unknown.
Children climb trees,
traverse logs across
rivers and race the wind
on plastic trikes down
suburban streets;
the road is their playground
the beach is their ocean
this life is theirs
for the taking.
Freedom to believe
one’s own heart
has never been
an allowable state
of being;
instead we force
belief into a box
and hold each heart
behind iron bars..
We thought the whole world
knew that night that a baby
had been born.
But apart from some shepherds
who had an inkling
they had been privy
to something not of this earth,
for most it was just as if
another nameless sparrow
had fallen to the earth.
That birth
brought fire
to the earth,
it came with a sob
that echoed
down through
two millennium
and the tear
is still being wiped
from her cheek.
My sins have turned to scarlet
Against the falling snow
And the hands once lent me here
I was a fool to let them go
In the spring
Youth steps out
To stamp its will on life
To make a mark
Upon the seasons
And the times
But in the end
Quietly comes
The ageing winter
And life itself
Has stamped its will
On youth