Like A Poem I Meant To Write

Simon and Garfunkel: Leaves That Are Green

Ragged mountain rocks efface the path.
Twilight comes to the temple and bats hover.
Outside the hall I sit on steps and gaze at torrential new rain.
Banana leaves are wide, the cape jasmine is fat.
A monk tells me the ancient Buddhist frescos are good
and holds a torch to show me, but I can barely see.
I lie quiet in night so deep even insects are silent.
From behind a rise the clear moon enters my door.
In the dawn I am alone and lose myself,
wandering up and down in mountain mist.
Then colors dazzle me: mountain red, green stream,
and a pine so big, ten people linking hands can’t encircle it.
Bare feet on slick rock as I wade upstream.
Water sounds -- shhhh, shhhh. Wind inflates my shirt.
A life like this is the best.
Why put your teeth on the bit and let people rein you in?
O friends, how can we grow old without returning here?
--Han Yu
Mountain Rocks

MY HEART BROKE LOOSE ON THE WIND
CHARLES BUKOWSKI: "POEM FOR MY BIRTHDAY"
AND WE GET OLDER WITH THE SILENT YEARS
DREAMS IN PROGRESS