There comes a time                           What is time?

When nothing matters                        Once, everything mattered

When memories become                

Like mist rising from the forest floor                                                    

     Yes, it is true, as we age, everything blurs

After a sudden hail storm            

                                                             I never imagined this happening/ To me/

                                                                Every year, less matters.

                                                                 Only the essentials

Pairing away, the superfluous, the outer 

shell. I wish I understood this ten years ago/

                                                                Watching my parents die. I did not. 

                                                                 Fuck the ego that keeps us bound.

On a cold spring 

New England day.                                    Cold, I’m cold so often,

There comes a time                           The joke of our lives, this thing called time.

When nothing matters                        Once everything mattered

Creation meaningless                        Once I saved everything I made/ everything 

     I wrote/

  Once everything I said seemed

  Momentous, there was a time when         everything mattered.

Ha! Achievements for what

                                                               To prepare us for war. To prepare us for 

Thinking, never me.                            I, I am immortal.

                                                           Achievements are still what it is all about. Until.

                                                             It’s such an ugly word. A-Chieve-Ment/

Mint. Yes, It’s all just like wild mint, pungent,     bitter, sweetened with honey with illusion. 

The sounds of wings beating            Still, I swoon

Mingling with the imperceptible        still the imperceptible is what I most cherish

Interwoven with the icy.                    As winter turns now to spring.

There comes a time when 

Hope becomes a distant star                 But there is hope in the spring flowers

When the mystery of love                     In the call of the Red Winged Blackbird.              

No more compelling                             In this wild Ferris ride called living.

When disintegration                            Is all we see. The multi-colored yet faded

Leaves under water                            on the forest floor.

Disillusionment of body & mind 

All that is left. 

~ In Two Voices @ Susan Gesmer, 2022-2023