Fragment

I saw today the child I once was
           I saw the fields and the woods
where I played from dawn to dusk
           the foxes and the squirrels
that wandered through those days
           caught the heavy scent
of life in all its vegetative glory
           the fallen trees riven with decay
riddled with a swarm of insect life
           feeding upon the death of fibrous bark

and on the edge of a clearing
           a wild rose that seemed unchanged
from all those years ago
           as though time had passed it by
its petals pure as any truth
           a beauty unfurled for all eternity

John Lyons