By Larsen Bowker
I’d always assumed we all get some small bit
of wisdom before we die, believing it came
from some centrifugal force of the mind, but at
nearly eighty and no sign of any, I was scaling
back on this gentle hubris, until I heard some
in a friend’s voice as we talked about a ritual
Valentine dinner with our wives . . . words swift
as a swallow’s flight through the air at dusk,
and slow as the pyramid’s shadow, guiding me
toward that place where the singing comes from,
where memory grows on the Black Walnut tree he
brought from his and planted in my backyard half
a lifetime ago. I no longer own that backyard, but
the tree still sings the lime green lyrics of spring,
the dark green song of summer, and yellow and
gold arias of autumn—incorruptible witness to our
endless search for renewal of that thing we can
never name, but for which we search all our lives.