On the road that passes from the old, dead world

unto green glades under a cloud-ridden sky,

a traveler takes in the sweet mists

and is reminded of a dream.

Breathing out, he shares what life he has

with the long, unkept grass

flowing as waves atop a stormy sea;

waves that break against the stony road

and sink back toward trees skirting the northern fringe,

whose wind-tussled leaves shiver in the gusts

of early autumn.

The ashen Sky, his guardian,

She groans from labor pangs,

withholding until the last second

the bounty thus preserved from its conception

as God might retain such gifts until some fullness of time…

if only time would ever grow full.