Of Moment-tears

Oh, I am not impatient now

To see the snow slip from the trees

For soon time’s fixed, tenacious flow

Will claim it to my memories

And I no longer beg the hour

To leap into fair middle-June

For I have seen its virgin-flower

Garnish the sweep of autumn’s swoon

And I have heard the echo of

A balled writ of things I love

In sanguine swell a tender tune

Tinctures the knell of harvest-moon

And I no longer fret the day

Or love’s moment-metered pretext

For who am I to dare to say

‘Tis worse or better than the next

For like the snowflake decks the ground

In myriads of gathered gasp

They melt away without a sound

Sand-sparkles slipping through our grasp

Leaving no timeless, tangent proof

And soon the hour that stood aloof

Descends; joy precedent to grief

Winter, the bud of spring’s relief

No, I no longer cling or clutch

To hour-rendered offerings

But treasure, while they grace my touch

Life’s trial-and-triumph sufferings

For who can tell what waits beyond

Raw gale or golden-gilded sweep?

The lily drifting on the pond

Does not divulge its murky deep

And we cannot expunge the wrought

Nor form the future in our thought

But it is ours to smile or weep

Time’s moment-tears we cannot keep

© Janet Martin

'I'm sick of this weather', said Matt, as he trudged out to wait for the bus this morning (the cold more bitter because his sister's bus was cancelled due to the rain-snow duet:) I don't care for this weather either but I no longer desire to rush moments; transparent tick-tocks ever nudging the fledgling nearer to the edge of the nest...