Double-Edged

1 January 2008, 8:29 PM

Elysium is never what we think,
rarely even what we want, truth be told.
Yet here is one blade between us-

this one gift never fades.

Two others come and go, but this is ours-
small though the comfort may be
when the little ones are parted from us,
this succor nonetheless is ours,
and light and life and goodness enough
to sustain us as we learn
the bitter-sweet, brutally blessed curse;
the gracious, double-edged cut of the blade.