Under Sentence.(Poem)

 
UNDER SENTENCE 
 
   At Easter, you learned you would die. 
   It was autumn bright the sky 
   on the day you were told-- 
   the gorse up the hill still gold. 
 
   Not yet, they insisted, not yet. 
   You might even at times forget 
   what the year would bring-- 
   might be round for one final spring. 
 
   Now, evanescent as snow, 
   or as cloud drift shifting low 
   over the valley floor, 
   or light through a closing door, 
 
   the first white blossom breaks free 
   on the outmost twigs of a ...