‘HORSEMAN, PASS BY’

Over time, the bravado fades; the long quiet of death helps

a silence, encouraged,

to take on a weight

its first appearance failed to suggest;

but not as an albatross,

or death prefigured,

or insincere reflection

upon the gravity of graves;

instead, as an affirmation of the soul.

To cast a cold eye on life,

and on death,

is an invocation

of the power and meaning

of identity,

free of time and condition,

best sensed as God’s inspiration

in the creation of mountains,

and even in the poet’s grave

that lies beneath.