Here Comes Sadness
By John Herlihy

I
Who can account for sadness;
It creeps into the heart and settles down.
Something happened that has induced a frown,
That soon turns hollow making the heart close down.
Yes, something has happened; does it matter what?
The feeling begins as an uninvited melancholy,
With the hint of turning into a useless folly.

II
Snow falling on village roofs seeking the ground,
Stir feelings of sadness without making a sound.
Chimneys calling forth smoke from the family hearth,
Making way through the night on its own lonely path.
We make a pact with sadness; the devil is ours to command.
Sadness turns to promise as it makes everything seem sadly grand.
Everything in the world takes on deep sadness as in a spree,
The emotion is contagious infecting everything we see.
At the heart of this abiding sadness was none other than me.
Who could believe that this could happen to such as we.

III
The frogs croaked their sympathy from murky swamps;
The cry of the loon sent condolences from its midnight haunts;
Even the crickets stayed awake to wail thru the night on my behalf,
As I stood forlorn in the night shadows, leaning on my staff.
The world of nature issues messages of sympathy during the night,
The spring twilight induced a sweet sadness comparable to delight.
Why even the stars winked in conspiracy from high in the distance,
Their gaze aimed straight into the heart with unexpected persistence.
It seemed the whole world was grieving and my sadness grieved as well,
Uniting myself and the world in pure harmony that felt like a magic spell.