-- All Things Pass --

John Herlihy

We often invoke the adage that all things pass;

Its grim specter of meaning always there, alas.

The innocent infant turns a rough-house child;

A confused adolescent becomes an adult, mild.

Our sorrows burrow underground and dig deep;

Our tears spill forth as evidence of lasting grief.

Pain has real presence with its aura of the eternal.

Will it go away, must I live with this ache infernal?

Our suffering seizes us with tentacles of their own;

We feel wrapped in its embrace, as if home-grown.

Death of a loved one seems to open a locked door,

Waves of misery crest without ever finding a shore.

Such instances always strike notes of inevitability;

Still, things occur to invoke the adage mercifully.

Our winter’s death will give way to spring’s birth;

Autumn’s fallen leaves adorn landscapes of earth.

The day lives long but eventually passes into night;

The night shines darkly because of the stars bright.

We take comfort in the notion that all things will pass;

Whether it be good or bad, nothing on earth will last.

We know this and we live this, we experience its truth;

Whether joys, miseries, or sorrows, we are never aloof.

Still, I confess, forget not, there is one simple exception;

The soul will live on, passing free, into God’s protection.

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(c) John Herlihy 23 August 2019