To let something fall away -
to shed a leaf
or watch a rainbow's
diminishing end
is a small thing.

And it seems there is no price
at all to pay
when the fruit
turns from green to red
and drops from the sky,
quietly melting back into the earth -
something lost and something gained.

To see myself
in recent seasons
is much like that.
I unfurled from a limb,
my reach tenacious -
out and out,
knowing all along
that parting
was part of the keeping.
I turned -
mostly with joy,
toward the sun.
I reveled much
in the changing.

And when I leapt
triumphant
into air,
it was not the losing
that I understood most
but all the hours it took to
reach that place.

I wait again now,
a million miles from sun and sky.
Buried beyond light and warmth,
I wait.

It’s not the losing that’s hard.

j. gebbie