Called By The Fire - Alan Cohen

[Larry Robinson]

Called By The Fire


Called by fire blazing in leaves,

 wandering  like Aengus into the beauty,

ambling a dappled circle,

tracing the cycle of my life.



Monkey mind names them:

Maidenhair, turkey, spicebush.

Sink into the beauty:

Awesome, fantastic, magnificent.

Words not enough.

Deeper to sounds, a protolanguage 

of feeling.

No mediation: ooh! gasp! Aaahhhh!

Finally pure awe, basking in stillness.



40 years in this place,

once, all enthusiasm and ideas,

so much to do, 

time seemingly unlimited.



Now, in my own autumn,

slowly trodding  a leafy Persian carpet of gold,

red grace notes ascatter, 

I see my whole life around me.



Past and future  - together.



Saplings abound -

Maple, hickory, beech.

Land becomes its true self,

hidden so long under ax and plow.



Nut to tree,

surging through leaf mold,

life rising from death.



Fallen white oak,

leaves curled brown,

on its path of return 

to the nurturing earth.

Surrendering  wholly to source,

as I will do in time.

Compost and foxfire, 

a fading glow,

lighting a path for those to come.



	- Alan Cohen
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