Poem for X and Don Quixote
by Richard Martin Oxman
NOTE: Upon request, I removed the name of a person above and replaced it with X.

When I was about my youngest son’s age, at the foot of a damaged stairway — perfectly ensconced in Edna St. Vincent Millay’s Steepletop — the great poet of God’s World infused me with her lines:

“My soul is all but out of me, — let fall
No burning leaf; prithee, let no bird call.”

Shortly before her death.

[Pause.]

Now that I am closer to the end of my life, I offer up the poem below:

I actually know quite a few souls
Who don’t feel the pain of a leaf
Falling from a tree

And, so, save the world, themselves.

Beautiful how earthshaking a falling leaf can be.