Inept

Embrace today, it slips away

Into the hold of tender thought

Forbid we miss its feather kiss

Because we wished for what was not

Inept at keeping season’s sweep

The leaping child, like budded leaf

Unfolds the vim of heaven’s hymn

And then succumbs to earthy Chief

Inept at stilling hour’s will

Where thrilling firsts are hugged and kissed

And then set free, a memory

To flower in the dreamer’s fist

Inept at swaying age-old ways

Of day to day, or thwart the foot

That trips to time that strips the vine

That treads to wine its grinning fruit

Inept to drink, save wink by wink

The gold-blue-pink of dawn-noon-dusk

To climb with care the spiraled stair

That never returns days to us

© Janet Martin