Assurance

Assurance


You will never be alone, you hear so deep
a sound when autumn comes. Yellow
pulls across the hills and thrums,
or the silence after lightning
before it says its names--
and then the clouds' wide-mouthed
apologies. You were aimed
from birth. You will never be alone.
Rain will come, a gutter filled,
and Amazon, long aisles--
you never heard so deep a sound,
moss on rocks, and years.
You turn your head--
that's what the silence meant:
"You're not alone."
The whole wide world pours down.


William Stafford

Posted over on Friends of William Stafford