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| Photograph by David Noah, Winterville, Georgia |
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Photograph by David Noah,
Winterville, Georgia
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Bob Ambrose
and Susan Richardson
Athens, Georgia
August 21, 2011
Reflections on a vision given to Susan
of Kelsey going to college; and on memories.
It is always so,
they go forth
bearing our biology
passed on from dawn
of life’s first day.
But so much more
they bear our dreams
on loan since Eve
awoke to wonder,
pondered, suffered,
lost her Abel.
Ever to the left
behind who love
enough to let
them go, may God
grant visions, offer
signs.
Of fair spring skies and foals in fields
enclosed by fences, sturdy gates
restraining safe the bounding colt
and bright-eyed filly. Safe, but kept
confined too long, they’ll never be
what God designed, and so to grow
and tame proud hearts, we lead them out
to wider fields across the hill where
far-off fences, unmanned gates give room
to run consumed by joy, constrained
till strong. The same our young.
But God steals hearts
and leaves gates open,
gates unguarded
but by love, a love
impressed inside
the growing, love
that’s fit for wider
fields, a love more
fierce than wildest
demon, love beyond
our gentle vision.
Within our gates are wide green pastures,
lush enough to feed a soul, sustaining
life a while, forever. Open gates, though,
promise more: they hold back magic,
mysteries, wild valleys, distant shores
and shadows, room to roam beyond our
vision, we who love them desperately.
They will go
through gates in time.
They will pass
beyond protection.
They will wander
far lands guarded
but by love.
And they will find
new fields to favor,
pastures they can call
their own.
So stay a while, forever with us, safe
in fences, you who go. You leave behind
you ones more fragile than you’ll ever come
to know. But go with God and bear great dreams
beyond the gate if that must be. If that
your coming home.
Yet all this, naught but
idle thought about the
sacred course of life
from hopes and fears
of aging hearts. We
open wide the inner
gate, remove the reins
and give a pat, then
leaning back we watch
you take short halting
steps. With somewhat
noble toss of mane,
turns into trot
then frisky canter;
prancing forth, you
lightly trample
tender trails through
meadow grass, and by
the time we turn
away, you’ve
disappeared
across the
hill.
I latch the inner gate, and my heart
catches, recalling how it felt to prance.
When you come home, let’s plan to dance.
I’ll let you lead. Please take my hand.
catches, recalling how it felt to prance.
When you come home, let’s plan to dance.
I’ll let you lead. Please take my hand.
