THE GARDEN, BEFORE DAWN

Perspective is everything. The angle
of the apples, as they fall
to the earth, attracting subterranean
life, docile in its disintegration.

In other ages, no doubt, dinosaurs
wandered here. We walk oh so softly
on their brittle black bones,
and breath the ever patient air.

There are no violets this season.
They will return, but this season
there are none. And leaves fall in
spasms, their passions clumsily spent.

An owl is suspended from the moon,
its shadow a cup for a kitten.
Willows shudder. Branches groan,
and I search for a symbol in a stone.

And time is a ticket to a memory, half-
lived, half-dreamed, and still unknown.