In a time

Thanks to Wally for this and for Thomas A Thomas for the poem

There are times when I feel trapped in time.

And this is one of those times, the year 2020,

a time in the impossible future I expected not

to be alive to see, and the month is August

and August is the month and time of litany.

It is the month of my one wedding, the month

of gaining a son who could have been thirty-one.

It is the month of our first walk along the salt

shore together, and of my beloved’s first illness,

harbinger of worse to come, month of our lost

mortgage, of bankruptcy, August of learning

my only brother had renal cell carcinoma, would

follow my father to that hard darkness so soon,

the month of disability determination, August

of a diagnosis at last, terribly final as it is.

And it is still the month berries ripen along

humid vines, corn ears swell in steamy fields,

as fawns fatten out of their spots, gorging on

clover blossoms and dandelion blooms, as seal

pups bask between fishing lessons, as fingerling

flash to avoid shadows as kingfisher young

learn not to make shadows as they dive, it is

the month apples begin to blush at the thought

of falling, time of joy upon joy, joy upon sorrow,

time of sorrow time of love upon love upon love.

© Thomas A. Thomas