Between Two Rivers

An absence of rain.

to have so much air
and heat and light
      dimi-
      nish-
      ing in fall

and not to have
      replenishing
      rain-
      fall is

to have poetry
(language to shape
      as the mind desires
      into currents
      for the body to bear)

and watch life
(old life;
      new life beginning
      to die)

slip away
unseen
by the eye

the way
water ascends
to vapor.

such a gift
we have abused,
this gift of poetry: