Within the Garden
18" x 24"
acrylic / canvas

He may have just stepped over the wall
leeward of the windswept trees,
down the path that has always been there,
past the white house
with the sad woman window
and the stone dyke where I hid a coin.

Perhaps he took up with the fishers
and hauls in nets with shimmering catch,
heartily laughs with the voice of a crewman,
casting a backwards glance towards me
over indifferent eyes of fish
which reflect the scudding clouds.

I hope he is a lighthouse keeper
his steady light might pierce the darkness
safe within a sacred duty
a wild place where the land and ocean
contend below the spray blown howl
down the coast where the accent changes.

Or beside the sheep who tell no secrets
he may have walked one summer morn
a last and lonely walk to bird song
the lark's small busy high sky lilt
making all his thoughts remember
the time he spent within the garden.