Elsewhere

There was an age in which this brown field,
the brown, veiny trees beyond,
the wind above like unbreaking surf,

could lure my feet
across the spongy soil
its brittle, weedy carpet,

into the stippled shadows
where the fellowship of empty branches
could brim me over
with shimmering melancholy.

However,
I am expected elsewhere,

and so a paler shade of feeling
must sustain.
 
 
—Lester Smith
 
 
(Originally appeared in Woud You Dance?)