“The Clues Within an Adirondack Glade: Son to Father” by Greg Lucas

Now that you’ve passed-through woods

deeper and darker than these

— climbed into eternity —

can you tell me, when our hearts stop,

and we’re poised among the mysteries that gather

around the bridge that we all must cross,

whether or not what we’ll then see

resembles this blustery Adirondack scene?

Here, spring contends with a devastating winter.

Ruthless winds, forever wailing,

have ripped gnarled branches from pine trunks.

On the brink of collapse, stripped white-birches

lean on devastated poplars, teeter and creak in gusts,

but they’ve dug-in just enough to prolong

their questionable ties to earth.

Wet snow whirls in mist imbued by light

— but from where does the light come —

from the last glimpse of the last morning,

or from the first glimpse of ever-lasting peace?

Somehow, in this cruel cold, bushes flower:

small yellow petals spotted with damp flakes flutter

in the breezes of a kinder season;

perhaps they draw warmth from far beyond this place.

The brook breaks free of its icy shroud

and flows past tremulous shadows

that I would not dare to venture through,

not without you as my guide to lead me.

But is there, I wonder, really much to fear

if the clues revealed in this Adirondack glade

hold true for that shattered second

when life fades?

 


Gregory Lucas writes fiction and poetry. His work has appeared in many magazines such as The Horror Zine, The Lyric, Blueline, The Ekphrastic Review, Literary Juice, Pif, and Neologism.

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