Below the dull gray sky
The earth had died amid
The chill of winter’s days.
Through a pane of frosted glass
The old man eyed the piled snows
Of yesterdays, and dreamt of times
When he was most alive
And felt the warmth of summer’s light.
Recalling then a sapling boy in spring,
Trying hard, as young boys will,
To fill a void within, searching
For the man he might become.
With hope and pride in what might be,
The child dreamt of worlds unknown
That he had only just begun to try
Amid the small anxieties of life.
Girls there were, with turquoise eyes,
Whose laughter he could hardly understand,
Who glanced at him amid the darkened sky
Of evening time with smiles,
Meant for him and him alone.
Wanting to entice the mysteries of love
He grabbed for praise that was not always his,
Or tried another’s ways to find
If they were right for him;
But after all was said and done
He could only be the boy he was.
Because experience he lacked,
He looked to others in his pack
Of friends who seemed to know
The whys and wheres of growing up,
Like when to fight or how to ask.
Day by day the boy would learn
The paths by which the world blows
Cruel and kind upon its young.
So slowly like the sapling he had been,
He learned to bend into the wind,
Growing stronger every day,
Until the time when he could wake
And stand without another’s aid,
To care for those whom he would love,
And find the man whom he’d become.
- Finding the Light of G‑d, pages 77-78