Up where the rivers divide
deadwood shadows the stars
firelight shakes on my coat
showing the letters you wrote
I miss what I have in my hands
the love so plainly there
writing itself into air
I guess you told me so

The pines on the hills 
are knives in the night
slicing the milky glow
a tale of goodbye tells me so

You know I can’t keep you from rising
out of my saddest songs
a decade of  misplaced redemption
I’d just slummed in my wrongs
you asked what I saw in my heart
you begged me to say that I cared
in a room silent and cold
I guess I told you so

The rocks in the river 
wear collars of white
priests of the broken flow
a tale of goodbye tells me so

Ships on a golden horizon
swans on a shaded green shore
the paint is the past on a canvas
and the brush has no use anymore
the bed in your studio
returns all that it knows
too late to tell me so

bridge
Paper to embers
paper to ash
paper floats up to moon
words rimmed in red
circle my head 
and close like an old looney tune

Farewell to your foreign language
that came to me so slow
how well the full translation
shows where the breezes blow
ashes to ash in the sky
the dust of your last goodbye
and no more to tell me so

A pack of coyotes 
yips at the moon
uniting above and below
a tale of goodbye tells me so

Photo: Valea Draganului, Pexels.com