Poetry Sunday: The Promise


March already? Where did January and February go?

March - the month when spring begins, when daylight saving time begins. The month when the swallows return to Capistrano and elsewhere. The month of changes.

The only constant in life, it seems, is change. We may wish things to remain the same and we may promise that they will. But we lie.

The Promise

BY JANE HIRSHFIELD
Stay, I said
to the cut flowers.
They bowed
their heads lower.

Stay, I said to the spider,
who fled.

Stay, leaf.
It reddened,
embarrassed for me and itself.

Stay, I said to my body.
It sat as a dog does,
obedient for a moment,
soon starting to tremble.

Stay, to the earth
of riverine valley meadows,
of fossiled escarpments,
of limestone and sandstone.
It looked back
with a changing expression, in silence.

Stay, I said to my loves.
Each answered,
Always.

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