Dreaming Circles (for Ray)

Like beads on a worn broken rosary

or wine colored leaves dropping
from the crown of a maple, people we love
depart from our lives, vanish
somewhere, (thin air?), one by one,
while we clutch what’s left of the string,
furtively touch each smooth trunk, remember

with love and anguish our lovers our friends,
recite feeble prayers, rail against long starless night,
deny death's bite, it's leaden wall (the sudden sound of an end),

or like a cynical monk refuse god’s unseen embrace,
either way wonder when and how
we too shall take our last
leave from home, abandon the circle, 

fall breathlessly

down

finally

into mother-earth’s mysterious floor,
seeding the patient ground
with dried leaves, discarded
beads, where each quietly
dissolves then re-enters
the sacred circle,
becomes in time's slow gleaming
a new tree of life, a world
of small miracles dreaming
itself seamlessly again and again
into the warm arms of being,
like the shining smiles and bright mind
of a brave, open-hearted friend
we shall always hold dear, 
even after we take our final leave
from the shelter of trees
in hazy, soft glowing moonlight.