For Our Beloved Sycamore

By Helen Killen-Stark

Under the lighthouse beam
Of the harvest moon
There lies a Sycamore longship
A scythe into the skies
Dashed upon an ancient reef
Where shooting stars
Shed burned magnesium tears
Of the deepest, brightest grief
Where comets came to say goodbye
Where mouse and wren
And frog and butterfly
Where earthworm and human
Petal, acorn and leaf,
Rose and slid and flew
And trudged and trekked and blew
To leave a flower upon your ancient door
A door which opened our hearts and lives
To the unspoken spell of nature
Our beloved Sycamore
Carrying us as a lifeboat
Over the unspeakable storms of life
The standing stones scream murder mute
The spring has buried next years fruit
Steel Rigg a silent, watchful giant
Shackled and blindfolded
No judge, no jury
Just the hellish screech of a chainsaw’s fury
The aurora shrinks away
Hand in hand with the Milky Way
Black holes shutter their vacuous eyes
Ghosts of Reivers shiver
A thousand Syrian archers
Shoot arrows aflame from bow to quiver
To pierce the harvest moon
Moonlight shatters with the heartbroken
As your cool leaves furl tight
Sails of the longship forever reefed
We will dream you alive again one day
Steeped forever in nature’s light.