Each day, a new formula,

taking into account the slight change

of the constellations

and your brittle position

within accuracy & precision;

your body's worth formidable & forlorn,

thoughts dim & sharp,

your days plentiful & dwindling

You remember your father

on his deathbed 1992, warm, unconscious,

a whimper of life still detectable

- then just a thing, an object,

jaw tied up, eyes closed,

a flower, a candle,

your fifteen minutes in the sickroom

And you recall your feelings

that unbelievable day in 2007,

when your sense of security, safety

and long-time assurance that all would be well

had to abide to the rules of life, and leave it;

that day in early spring

when your mother, at age 95,

drifted in and out of this world,

in clear moments knowing what was happening,

and grabbed your hand and kissed it;

a one-time occurrence,

and then you could actually feel the warmth

that had sustained you all your life

up till that moment,

being turned off, just like that;

the current silent, you shivering,

ashes to ashes, dust to dust

And now you tinker with your own age,

well realized

as you study the old photograph

from 1950,

which your older brother, at age 17, now 89,

took of the family

out on the farm in a wild-grown garden;

Mom, Dad, the dog Lorry and you at 18 months,

soon about to turn 75

Oh, the drift through time,

or the drift of time through you;

long memories,

and the present riddled with flashes

of bygone worlds,

the way things turn to or from you,

wind through trees and lives,

the grinding down of mountain ranges,

the appearance of star clusters,

an ant climbing up a straw

And I prolong this November morning

reading the poems of Lucien Stryk

while a housefly, out of season,

keeps buzzing, absentmindedly,

spiralling behind the curtain

over at the balcony window,

interspersing time with still life silences,

its winding motion coupled with nothing;

a Zennist unaware of itself;

today's Wabi Sabi

The dictionary is heavy

when I swing it within sight

Outside,

the sky is holding back

Here, my body laid out like a bridge,

time rippling