All day long the wind spoke
in a language I could not understand,
an aimless heave and surge of feeling
high in the branches of the trees.
The leaves in swags braided and unbraided
as at an altar where something was gathered
then scattered, indifferent to the cost.
My son sat nearby on the patio,
sketching my daughter as she read,
and his hand partook of that pitched silence,
the sibilant rush and stall of it,
restless partings and rifts of shadow
closing suddenly and without appeal,
a choice offered, then withdrawn forever—
until I heard my own journey announced.