Hope

We stand upon the threshold
wearied and thin in our thoughts
looking out from one room
into the echo of another

where beneath the gathering
darkness of the setting
of the cold fingers of the moon
and before the rise of the new dawn

we confront that hushed moment
where we find the voices run
shrill through our fingers
of those who would boast
in their manifest destiny
of a new world created
in the image of their conceit.

So we turn toward the mirror
in the numbness of that moment
and its enclosing silence
where even the gathering
of the birds offers little song
against the chill of the night

and in the numbness of that moment
in the reflection of the mirror
we look through the door
and into that other room
which is the swaddled moment
of the arriving new year

and we find within that moment
a candle distant yet deep
in its glow of promise
and we find within that candle
a cherished lone instant

where we may kneel renewed
upon the warmth of the garden of life
and against the despondent winds
of these darkest of times.

For we plant the seed deep
in the ground of our souls
and hearts, water it with honesty,
feed it with care and devotion.

We prune back the branches
lest they grow tangled
with deceit, and we pull the weeds
of arrogance from the base.

All the while we are kept
too busy to marvel at more
than the process in which
we are involved until…

…one day when we are buffeted
by the fears and pain of life
we discover that under the embrace
of its long green shade
we have a place of refuge
from the hot sun of despair.