Thursday, March 8, 2007

Iraq War Grief Daily Witness Day 37

John W. Morse comforts his daughter Kortni VanSlyke, 21, as the remains of her husband, U.S. Marine Pfc. Bufford 'Kenny' VanSlyke, are unloaded from a cargo jet at MBS International Airport in Bay City, Mich., Tuesday, March 6, 2007. VanSlyke, 22, died Feb. 28 after being shot at a checkpoint in Anbar province, Iraq.
(AP Photo/The Bay City Times, Kevin Hagen)


Let Evening Come
by Jane Kenyon


Let the light of late afternoon

shine through chinks in the barn, moving

up the bales as the sun moves down.


Let the cricket take up chafing

as a woman takes up her needles

and her yarn. Let evening come.


Let dew collect on the hoe abandoned

in long grass. Let the stars appear

and the moon disclose her silver horn.


Let the fox go back to its sandy den.

Let the wind die down. Let the shed

go black inside. Let evening come.


To the bottle in the ditch, to the scoop

in the oats, to air in the lung

let evening come.


Let it come, as it will, and don't

be afraid. God does not leave us

comfortless, so let evening come.


6 comments:

Jerry said...

for peace

anniethena said...

For peace
I witness

Maryscott OConnor said...

Light a candle AND curse the fucking darkness...

ask said...

I witness.

moira said...

Peace for Kenny Van Slyke. Peace and love to his wife.

musing graze said...

Witness

Unending Love
by Rabindranath Tagore

I seem to have loved you in numberless forms, numberless times…
In life after life, in age after age, forever.
My spellbound heart has made and remade the necklace of songs,
That you take as a gift, wear round your neck in your many forms,
In life after life, in age after age, forever.

Whenever I hear old chronicles of love, it's age old pain,
It's ancient tale of being apart or together.
As I stare on and on into the past, in the end you emerge,
Clad in the light of a pole-star, piercing the darkness of time.
You become an image of what is remembered forever.

You and I have floated here on the stream that brings from the fount.
At the heart of time, love of one for another.
We have played along side millions of lovers,
Shared in the same shy sweetness of meeting,
the distressful tears of farewell,
Old love but in shapes that renew and renew forever.