A Walk in the Woods

The woman and the child walk hand in hand
ahead. They chat, not heeding anyone,
not me, not you, my friend, who walk beside.
Stepping slow, I try to match your stride.
There comes a forking in the wooded way.
I call to them: they’re deaf to what I say.

And so I take the fork with you, my friend,
while knowing I might soon lose track of them,
yet certain that you’re all I know of truth;
you’re what I searched for in a misspent youth,
and what I’ve found quite near my journey’s end,
this way, a life, the truth—you—faithful friend.

Our path climbs fast up on this little hill.
I climb with you aware that if they will
rejoin us, all the two of them must do
is turn and raise their eyes toward me, toward you—
and others now. We crest the top, sit down,
and find we’re joined by those from far-off towns.

And all of us together build a fire
that flickers, flames, and flashes ever higher,
quite visible from anywhere one stands,
a signal to be seen from far-off lands.
Just here I’ll wait in peace for wife and child,
abiding with my friend, my lord awhile.

Two personal experiences underlie this poem.

First, at a recent “grandparents day,” I watched my wife and granddaughter walk ahead, chirping to one another, oblivious of me.

Second is a scene from “Out of Africa” (1985). Near the end Meryl Streep, as Karen Blixen, promises Malick Bowens, as her servant Farah, that she will light a fire so that he might find her. And then, of course, there’s their final farewell (pictured below), where she asks him to say her name.

He answers: “You are Karen, Sabu.”

It’s one of my all-time favorite movie relationships, much better than Streep-Redford!