for Helen
Time runs in place, too fast to see or know
like the moon reflecting off the tide
It lives in a sacred space, where the echoes go
and the horsemen of the sunset ride
There is a pattern to the leaves, to the birds that fly;
an arrow running through the stars, not seen by you or I
The wind whistles, or does it cry?
Lullaby, lullaby.
The roads diverge like you and I, like friends when time is spent leaving in between a ghost filled world. Across the gulf we can still hear a call both clear and distant it is there our best songs and poems are heard. It is there, across this distance our greatest songs are sung; it’s from the echoes of these valleys that our truest visions come. The wind whistles, or does it cry? Lullaby, lullaby.
The years trudge on, the sages say, or the sun would stop and fade away
the stars would get confused and die;
Lullaby, lullaby.
The day we first held something near was the day that we could lose it,
like the moment that we live in or the touch that we feel.
The moment waits for all of us if we have the strength to choose it,
or the courage to make it real.
Anything worth having has the power to break your heart;
it’s taking hold of it anyway that sets us all apart.
The wind whistles, or does it cry?
Lullaby, lullaby.