Surrender

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©  Steve King

All rights reserved

At last must I surrender all device,

though I shall have you here in any case.

Finally the evening’s crowd has passed,

and we are gathered well in solitude.

All things undone must linger in their place

and words unspoke must echo where they will;

large moments to give way to emptiness,

while we rehearse regrets for latter days.

This silence will beget the better voice

to move each note of mending through its way;

so between us there need be no cue,

no hardened rhetoric to stir the air;

just the knowing and the conjoinment

of old desires, ancient isolate hopes,

alive now in this spirit of new yearning.

Here then is the center we must hold,

and surety that we dare not efface,

no matter how the futures may incline.

We must abide while all old dreams unwind,

and as confusions rally in full throat.

This world does not offer us a choice:

all things move and we must stand aplace.

It is the beginning and end of time,

where all and nothingness at last collide,

where only instinct guides amid the rush,

and quick surmises serve forevermore.

I have never held to things so much,

nor kept a faith that served me all these days—

this sheltered hold alone must fend the fates,

and such adversities as may befall.

Though ageless dreams are all the while displaced,

and artifice has often sealed our ways,

this presence must endure, this hope remain,

‘til darkness does descend, and stillness reign.

Note:  "Surrender" will be posted on http://dversepoets.com/  Open Link Night.  Please visit there!

Clouds

©  2012 Steve King

All rights reserved

i saw

the rains had come

to chase the sun—

clouds

grey twilight wolves

moon is gathered in the veil

starlight tarries where it will

the shadows do come home to me

and so the room is empty no longer

no corner lit to hold a dream

nor the very thought of you

for long

this window

frames the perfect page

to save me the usual thousand words

Rites of Autumn

© Steve King 2011

All rights reserved

Leaves are fallen in the garden,

gone from lean black branches.

Bright hours are gone, too;

lost amid the equinoctial shade.

You could not count the leaves,

but would recapture hours,

recall them all;

silent as you watch the leaves

run before an autumn wind.

You let the moments slip,

used them to savor yearnings,

distant hopes,

idle revery.

Yet still the pull of yearnings,

yet still, desires unmet;

no moments in your bag

to hold them now.

Now memory is lean,

would feast upon new days

were they at hand;

would gorge upon

the promise of new dreams,

yes, even on the promise,

were there moments for a dream,

were there moments for a promising.

Without leaves on high

there is silence in the wood,

save for the one song:

when winds sweep low,

falling from the mountain,

gathering its chill.

Alone in the garden,

heir to the song,

to vistas of lean black branches—

this song will not scribe a memory,

nor hold a moment rapt for you,

more than may the lean black branches

recall scattered leaves.