time for poetry

Yes, we're are few days past Summer Solstice, but I like the image of the illuminated pilgrims mentioned in the last line.  Happy summer from a cool and misty climate.

gorgeous hydrangeas on my morning walk

The Return

by Thomas R. Smith

Unto Him all things return. The Koran

Walking on the park road

early morning, summer solstice,

we came to a place in the still-

shaded cool where, looking

up a grassy hillside,

we could see, through a gap

in the trees, the rising sun.

Burning clear with all

heat and strength befitting

the day of its longest dominion,

the sun, boiling from that

high nest of foliage,

lit a silver swath

of sparkling, dew-bent

grasses all the way down

the drenched slope.

So brilliant was that carpet

of light the sun unrolled

down the hill to our feet,

we stopped where we were

and sat awhile in pure wonder.

And I remembered an old

secret promise, deemed

unwise to speak, though

who could deny it,

seeing these folk, humble

yet adorned, nodding together

on their way back to the sun?

And soon enough we got up

again and wandered on

into whatever we had to do

on that day, though not unchanged,

having accompanied a little distance

on the morning road of their return

those illuminated pilgrims.

(One of the courtyards at Timber Ridge; retirement center where I work.  And where I need to live when I'm 65.)