Days of Passing (For Elizabeth)

These are days of passing. All day long
I hear the flights of geese conducting south.

You're heading north to Medford. It is tough
to know I can't protect. You're on your own.

Which is as it should be. But all the same
your empty room means I am moving on
to my own kind of school and toward the rest
I have earned while you have just begun.

I understand that I shall never know
the beauty you'll accomplish, not in whole.

I know some parts already and am proud.
And so it is with pride I let you go

to what it is awaits, to your own place
and wish you all the best. Not much for prayers,

I wish for you good love and much success
and not a lot of sickness, pain or death

among the ones you love. I will move on
and that is how it is. You should take joy

from all the joy you've brought, with luck confront
the things I didn't do and should have done

and things I did that you would never know
but may bring thanks. So I pass on

to southward like the geese and other birds.
These sounds are yours to keep and build upon.