Equinox

  September.  I once stayed with you because
  I thought I could distinguish right from wrong:
  The kids were growing up, you had just lost
  Your job and all your confidence was down;
  Yet you hated me and took it out on me
  For all that was and all that couldn’t be,
  And as I watched the shades of summer turn
  I knew I couldn’t leave you on your own.
 
  A dozen seasons later, your new job
  Is thriving and your confidence is strong,
  The kids are grown up more and anymore
  You’ll be all right.  You don’t need me around.
  I turn to watch the sunlight slip away
  And see the time diminish every day
  And still I stay with you, but now because
  I dread the thought of being left alone.

  The equinox is fleeting, but I try
  To hold on to its balance for as long
  As tilting worlds allow; we lean away
  From warmth and I can feel the harder ground
  Of colder days to come, and even now
  I know I should move on, or move somehow,
  But as the autumn winds blow through the leaves
  Of September my cold feet turn into stone.
 
 I hope that there may never be an end
  To anything, from dawn to dusk to dawn;
  That fall is just a stop along the way
  To winter; that beyond this we are bound
  Eventually to see another spring
  And then wherever time and fate will bring
  Us, traveling together or apart
  But never, through these autumn woods, alone.