Extremes and Means

PoeticBloomings Day 4 AND I QUOTE SUMMER
“What good is the warmth of summer, without the cold of winter to give it sweetness.”
from “Travels With Charley: In Search of America” by John Steinbeck

 

Should I be thankful to the cold
for revealing the comfort of warmth
for sorrow’s ache that looks to joy
for hate that contrasts love deployed?

Is that why at Adagio for Strings I cry
or weep at a sunset slathering the sky?
Are all the baser things of life allowed
so we can be attuned to the exquisite?

Oh, summer is this why with such frenzy
I embrace your golden light, dread the entry
of winter’s shivery silver lusterless matte
when my mood becomes shriveled, flat?

Winter to summer, spring to fall
and all the shades of element mixed
in God’s cauldron of life and death.
Heaven and hell betwixt.