These we leave to those

At the temple there is a poem called "Loss" carved into the stone. It has three words, but the poet has scratched them out. You cannot read loss, only feel it. ~ Arthur Golden , Memoirs Of A Geisha

損失

Let us feel this thing then. At the Temple of Rain where
sorrows go to drown themselves in the selfless tide of pity
we will throw ourselves into, the space made by every given
thing we accept as gift for the time it must one day be returned.

Greater people than we have been forgotten, and those who
loved them, too, long unremembered. Sands have risen, sands
have shifted, sands have scattered. What we do in this life so
rarely matters beyond its time of doing. Think on yesterday.



And think of those who came together, who loved in their
wet season of loving until the dry acre sung no rice to the
empty bowl, the cricket’s bow fell stilled by the hard husk
of winter ice, and their deep sky went forever black with stars.

These we leave to those who will never know our gift: spaces
between solemn processions of distant lanterns; secret recitations
spoken before windless candles; prayer wheels muted by devout
introspections of penetrating gazes more devoted than ours.

Joseph Gallo
May 6, 2013