Old Man's Communion with a Young Man

 

We talked, you and me:

you in the spring of your life;

mine almost fully drained,

yet it’s dregs, sweet still –

Always hope, eternal, they say: that is mine.

Is it misplaced? I cannot tell –

yet I cling to it. It is mine, that hope.

 

Embrace your young days, young man, I say;

they will not come again.

 

I reach the end: mine the last curled crust.

I take it with gratitude: mine is the trust

in things eternal; in things to be,

so I say, as we talk, you and me.

 

Yours is the whole loaf; take it, and eat:

do not decry those small crumbs at your feet:
one day you may need them, I hope you do not,

but if hunger arises,

gather them up, against life’s grim surprises,

though never may you gather them, lest to eat

in your soul’s wretched falling,

if then life is deplete –

 

No! take life, lay before you –

all its joy, all its pain

and remember we talked, you and me, as the rain

kissed our faces like angels’ caresses. 

 

I remain.

 

Go ahead, young man, it is plain

we shall not on God’s sweet earth

meet, share communion again…

 

 

Dorinda MacDowell