Awakening

For many years i found the fall and winter a depressing time of year. About three years ago i found that i had inexplicably stopped being down during that time of year. Not long after that, during a beautiful spring day, Naw Ruz (Bahá'í New Year) i found my muse. i started to write and my writing took on a new and higher purpose. My poetry, long dormant, came back with a vengeance and continues to come to me as i take one of my daily walks or other odd times of the day. The beginnings of this poem came to me as i took my walk yesterday by the lake. The breeze was coming and the leaves were falling, though it was still a warm Lakeway/Austin day.

Awakening

For many a year i recall
The clouds roll in
The air chills
The coming of fall

For too many years
The leaves fell
Like shed tears
Upon the ground
The wind swirls
A kaleidoscope unfurls
The trees lay dark,
Barren and withdrawn

Like those trees
Hunkered down
i shed my leaves
And felt as if
i would drown
In sorrow

Alone in darkness
Craving light
Reaching without leaves
For any sight
Of Light

Then one winter
Not long ago
A change occurred
That opened a door
An evergreen did i become
With joy the fall, i bid welcome

The light is there
If we care
To see
It all depends on
How we chose
To be

With open arms i did embrace
my former foe and lost all trace
of sorrow and pain
with the autumn rain
and with leaves i reach out
for the sun
and embrace the new self
that i have become

shiidon, November 2007