KS Culbreth

Reunion

This light is, that was; and your shadow
A haunting-over from distant lands
Consoles, with her palsied hands, a widow
Stills a moment midnight’s rousing winds;
While Time reclaims what light lends,
A wraith drifts through your open window.

Hour of the splendid grass grows
Into those years that we are
To which we shall add, despite the growls
Foiling the fond remembrance of young dares
That brushed us by, our fruitful tears
Dried by the blushing wind howled through our souls.

Late on the lone porch August ends
With tinkling chimes fluttering like wings
Year upon year feeds as on lucky finds;
To fill the empty echo of victory songs
And make sense of this confusion of tongues,
With our leavened yeast and wrung grape skins,

Forsaking Time grants us these loves
That atone our waste of senseless chase.
Again we commune; share lustral loaves,
The spill of wine our shadow casts
The failing touch that mars a tender crust,
This fading light, each generation craves.