You Begin

This is how it happens: How a dog-eared evening With a long, sad face And wrinkled clothes Reminds us that temporary things Must be temporary. How boulders are turned into stones; How comedy and tragedy become history; How we become strangers all over again. It feels like tiredness; It stretches on and on like insomnia; It is as relentless as absence Yet, oh how it transfigures everything! First: It does so without malice. Second: It does so without conspiracy. Third: It does so without blaming anyone. So rake the leaves back onto the trees If it helps you; Buck up and stiffen the soft horizon; Push back the killing frost And hold the hunter moon at abeyance: The trees and the plants and the farmers Will not mind one bit. But I swear, this is how it happens, This is how it starts And where would I be in you otherwise?