Greybeard

Greybeard

The wind is from the west and blows the storm.

You’re grey in my thoughts,

blown across sky, my very grey matter,

puffed far like a cloud from a smoldering pipe,

blown quick as the cunning flight of grey doves

who understand the shadow of the hawk,

cloud pale with the cottony softness of mare’s tails

flying above waves to veil the sun’s glare

when the sea is finished with drama, content to be softened,

washing living and dead in its slow endless pulse.

You’ve lost all the red

angry words, the ice white silences

long ago and your soft words stir oatmeal smooth and

rumble, plump cats by the hearth fire, dozing near the embers.

Your voice is a lullabye, secret

and tender as a ruffled wren with a ruby glass heart,

clear as the night sky swinging her moonshot skirts,

pink mother of pearl, with the round white moon daughter

on her opalescent cushions gently

turning the bowl of sky to prism the earth with silver light.

You and I danced for for so long

circling our lives, wrapping the bands around the maypole,

weaving the yarns of years to make the tale

we now tell together, of   two journeys

that became one traveling, filled with the scarlet clamor of blood

and the black and purple bruises of grief,

across a mad planet to a place of moss and stone

where the dancers can rest, and the journey can end

with  the grey hairs of wisewomen and white

beards of wizards nodding together.

January 2010

Image : Old Man With Flowing Beard Looking Down Left
Rembrandt Van Rijn, courtesy, rembrandt online