If I never saw another morning sky
nor waked to hear the sparrows on the lawn,
if roses gave no scent when I walked by
and all the butterflies were dead and gone,
there still would be their memory in my mind
(for beauty is not merely for the sense)
and every place I looked for it, I’d find
a way to grow from each experience
For life is in the living, here and now
and does not linger long in sight and sound;
It dwells in death and rebirth, and somehow
remains, among all simple things, profound.
The end? In truth, that day will never come;
we merely pass from bread, to toast, to crumb.
31 MAY 2003
