The Passing

it forks at the fallen apple tree limb in the brook

and shapes stones to its will

it lies still among the broad leaved cattails

and does not care of the mallard’s play

or the watersnake’s glide

under the sundart stare
it rises and rides the random wind
falls again and rises again
to the unknowable prosody
of the eternal return

sometimes, it touches dust
in just the right way

and yawns wide the garden air

it seeps and seeks

to find its own

then leaves the dust

breathless, once again

as if it never was

I cannot argue with water

-Stan A. Baldwin-