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Raking October light, low and warm,
the afternoon I drove down, toward La Cienega.
Cottonwoods and willows, lit from behind
by late afternoon sun, yellow as sunflowers
along the Rio Arribe,
Against the rust earth beyond the river,
against the steady dark green
of junipers higher on the banks.
That night, autumn’s first cold,
a front from the Bering Sea,
after summer had held for a long time,
brought a cutting wind
and leaves began to fall in showers.
Rattled along coyote fences
and across the road
under hard clear stars.
Daylight saving time ended.
We awoke to find the sun already risen.
And darkness fell before
we were finished with the day.
In the morning what leaves remained
were the color of the red earth.
Each phrase recalled becomes a stay.
A snapshot held up against a background
of swaying branches, birds arcing south.
A record of transient sense
that can be revisited.
The moments past, yet they resonate
like strings on an instrument in a still room
to a sympathetic voice,
the entry into a cycle of memory
that rises into new vision –
a silent space made of words.
Luminescence risen from shadow.
This poem was written on the occasion of my
last visit to an old friend in New Mexico, who died
of liver cancer two weeks later.
He was lucid and had only manageable pain until
the end.
In the middle of a conversation with friends, he
turned to his wife and said
- I have to leave now.
A few minutes later, he raised his arms to a presence
in the room that only he saw, and said,
- I'm very happy to see you.
Shortly after that, he fell asleep.
An enviable passing.
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