Autumn

Mary Oliver says leaves dazzle in Autumn
because life lives strongest before it dies.

There is also the death that grasps the branch even as it falls through air,
or that lets go even as the branch remains.

A child asks "What will happen?"
This kind of death answers, "Here's what,"
and looks at what the leaf is doing.

Mary Oliver's death looks at the tree and the leaf, to see
how they respond to wind, to forest, and sky.

And says, "Let's see."

Once I lived my life knowing everything.
It saved me from despair, which was good for me then.

Now I live my life sometimes knowing,
and sometimes not.

How is it possible to hold on and to let go?

There is a pulse kept by monks in many temples around the world.
It is a pulse the Earth herself keeps.
Like the heartbeat, it closes, it opens.  

Everything that ever was, is, and shall be
emerges from the eye of that needle.

Where is the needle?
Seek, and ye shall find.
Find, and be found.

This kind of death roils through the blood,
but there is a kindness in its burning.

This kind of death is like the windows of my house:
drawing in brilliance of afternoon sunlight
from wind-tossed leaves that glitter the walls,
my body, my eyes.

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