Fecundity

by Vincent Katz

to Alessandro Twombly

I accept anything my children give me
Those things are kept in a special place

The place of my own things has less and less importance
If I travel to another place, it is not because of me

This is something I am learning, over and over
Eventually, a calm overtakes the situation

There is waiting, and the move from place to place
But there is the non-moving too, the non-waiting

We are fathers, sons, and we share a sense of life
As something given, something received, in every moment

For example, the sun rises and causes tomatoes to ripen
The sun and the tomatoes are parts of our lives

There is no escaping the earth, or
The patterns we make on it

Those are the givens, and inevitable decay,
Weakness, are parts of it, not to be shunned

One day, the light will grow very weak,
Not the final day, but one near it

And you will realize that light too is the same
And so is its disappearance

Published on April 20, 2022