Harvest

Days long with innocent pleasure,
The simple trust of childhood
Unquestioned continuity.
Endless summer days
Fruit laden trees
Rich harvest.

Days of broken innocence,
Splintered shards of trust
Famine strips home bare
Of mother and sisters
Boyhood ends
Harvest fails.

Days of growing
Into manhood,
Far from home,
Mind seeking,
Challenging, probing,
Harvest seeding.

Bayonet ruptures
Adolescent pride
Certainty swept away
In crowded cattle trucks
To Siberian death
Harvest icy tears.

Season's end

Leaves drift, tears drift,
Migrating downwards
In this season's ending.

Seasons of nature,
Seasons of life,
Mourn for the summer,
Grieve for your life.

All is change,
Transmutation
Life flowing into death.