Though Nature turns her back on me and rues,
her quiet doting ways have always shown
she sees me eased reliance count its fare
as shards of shackled masses, not my own.

(Though steps now glisten as sparks now fly,
my pathways climb into the sky...)

So many graven images here fall
by brief but brazen winds there blowing cold:
I once had built a castle high upon
the sands, believing trusses there would hold.

(But steps there faltered in fire and flame; 
my trek inched onward still the same... )

Dark shadowed shoulders burdened blackened form
amidst a dusty grist of sifting sands
recall a clouded cost, these passing years
when poetry could not unbind the hands.

(Then steps there wandered, well way-laid
as silent guile within betrayed...)

But Time now stands to reck this wounded will
and place it on a path again anew:
within its hopeful heart a dream instill
to share the way, a friend at thirty two.				.