Admonition

(To an old schoolfellow departing for the mountains of the East, there to practice her profession and indulge her taste for the far away.)

You do not owe me this, but still I charge you:

In the name of common cause
between all fellows,
kith of every kind

— yoke-mated in formation,
axle-paired, aligned in step,

or scattered as the Pleiades,
flung piecemeal, cast haphazard —

think of me.

Ringed azure
by the mountain sky,

do this:

watch the sundial;
let it tell a quarter-circuit;
while you wait, reflect;

think of my days.

You will be far from me.
Still,
your mind’s eye should
fetch forth a picture:

no sundials where I am;
there never will be.
No ridge, no blaze of blue,
no crack of rock.
No slow sigh of moss
beneath a lizard’s
winking patter-weight.
None of these things.

Healing is your business.

But, while you watch the sundial,
do this:

think humbly on wounds.

Think on loss and ravages.
Think on what is gone.

For a quarter-circuit,
think of me.

Then, when the wheel of things has called you home,
come;
look at me.

Pale gold with upland air,

come to me and look me in the face.