These trees in Buddhist saffron robes,

renouncing everything,

becoming naked without fear,

in wind that is a part of them,

disclose a beauty in this death,

become new shapes, interior.

To live they cannot hoard;

this losing, too, is growth.

New shapes emerge, new vision clears.

Surrender strengthens in the soul

another song.

This emptying is confidence

in spring, but more—a faithing

in the growth that’s come before,

a counting of the gifts

and then releasing one by one,

so as to give again,

knowing growth is not a season,

but is in the root of things.

This is no losing,

but a becoming.

Coveting such openness

of limb and heart and hand,

such bareness in the singing,

I only now discover that I want

this wind, blowing where it will,

Within