CONVERSATION

This conversation is like a long walk

together in the autumn woods.

Mossy silence of shadow, eloquent longing

of birds, thunder softened by distance.

A stag crosses the trail up ahead,

wildness we had thought extinct.

Leaves, the shades of earth, fall at our feet,

gifts from the wind we have to accept.

And now, just at goodbye, where the trail

divides,

sudden pathos of sweet rain.