A WALK WITH AN OLD SCHOOL MATE

Through the tall yellowing grasses of autumn
Whose predicting bite of wind is enough
To remind that much time has passed,
We spoke of childhood's anticipation
Much diminished as the heart deepens,
Much forgotten as the hair grays.
My tall brown boots are hidden as I shuffle
To the rhythm of your increasingly shrill question,
Hoots whose leather once less cragged sharply clicked
On youthful stone en route to unrevealed
Possibilities, potentials, undefined paradigms,
Now softly trod in field earth far off any path
Aimlessly this way then that, aft invisible scowl
Warding off your persistence and prying.
“Why have you grown so uncaring?”
In so many words and others more obscure,
It is your point to make that I no longer
Share in your commitment to the world,
No longer wear the braid and medals
Of dedicated youth, of crimson spirit endeavor
In the teeth of the howling age, in spite
Of the vicious response, for the love
Of fighting when the fight is as futile
As the cause is beautiful, in the eye of the storm
In impossible proportion to our
Self-imposed limitations, and because of this
I beg your indulgence as I leave it
To the dusty past it inhabits, torments
And remains unresolvable even to imagination,
In our short time, or in all to come.

© Celeste Plowden 2010