Beyond Recall

[churinga]

The river's mist has risen to confine
my view, and threatens, slowly, to subsume
the deadfalls in my mind. In all directions
it's progressed beyond the valley floor,

to seek this woodland crest of recollections.
The fog, far denser than it was before,
now clouds that elm, those oak; soon to consume
this copse of pine where lovers would recline.

I sense no haunt of lost loves in the mist,
but sense instead the loss of love I'd found.
The day that I exist beyond my memory,
there'll be no elm, no oak, no copse of pine.