Headland

1

There will be time for reading books
and time for sitting on the grass,
time for looking at the shadow cast
by the house we lived in as children.

There will be time to pick up pebbles by the sea
and, if that is not enough for you and me,
time to wander further out than that,
over to the headland where there are
flecks of light flickering
and people gathering on the beach
to look at the fallen man.

But now the Hendersons are coming
and things must be made ready.

ii

Shall I translate the personal
into another language:
a seaside scene or
strange disclosure at a hospital,
distant cousins meeting at a funeral,
or the expected arrival of the head
of a family?

Let us step into another district,
walk this lonely forest path,
enter a magic theatre of the heart
where one is author,
crowd and all the cast,

But for now this will have to do,
this will really have to do.

You see, the Hendersons are coming
and things must be made ready.