The Dash

When first we come into this silent world,

No memory attends the birth hour.

We wake as though the earth had long prepared

A place for us within its serene round.

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So gently does our being here begin

That time itself seems slow to make its claim,

Yet onward still it moves with a soft step,

Marking the course no living heart can stay.

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There will be two small dates to hold our name,

One at the dawn, one at the closing light,

And all we are and all we dare to love

Will rest between them like a fragile rope.

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Yet in that narrow span how much is given,

The chance to walk among our fellow souls,

To meet their eyes and feel within ourselves

A kinship deeper than our words can show.

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For though we wander each a separate road,

Our days are intwined through a common air,

The joys we kindle travel far beyond

The hour in which they first were brought to life.

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A kindness offered does not fade away,

It settles softly in another heart,

And from that quiet place it may arise

To brighten lives we never shall behold.

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So while the morning of our days remains,

And while the evening has not yet drawn near,

Let us not pass unmindful through the light

That falls so briefly on our mortal way.

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Pause when a moment asks to be received,

Give freely of the warmth that dwells in you,

And cherish well the life that you have found,

For none shall walk this very path again.

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At last, the closing mark will come to all,

And silence gather where our voices were,

Yet what we shaped within that slender line

Will linger still within the lives we touched.

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Thus is our brief existence made profound,

Not by its length but by the love it holds

While passing through the quiet space between

Our first appearing and our final rest.