THE APPROACH OF THE OLD YEAR

In the Midst of Winter, I finally found there was within me an invincible summer.
Albert Camus, Return to Tipasa (1954)

The approach of the old year arrives
in dark gulches where redwoods define the meaning of time, 

darkness and light, where an understory of worlds hides,
grows, an entire life beneath their boughs.
Each year, the huckleberry and wild rose bloom,
leaving small gifts for us, whether bird or bear,
that dark beauty is filled with such sweet flavor
that even the gods would weep.
I live in a rented room that does not see
the sun for six months of the year,
and in the distance I can see
how the outstretched limbs of trees
reach toward the sky, as if bent in supplication
toward the east where the sun rises
faithfully each morning, like something akin to hope.
Not long ago it was the eye of the inferno looking back.
We are reminded the fire is also the darkness in the light
waiting to cleanse the earth and move on
to more clement shores.