My annual pilgramage has brought me here.

Sixteenth of August: twenty times I have
paused, pondered, passed. This year is much the same.
Familiar meteors aflame above.
Below I lay unsettled, strange, profane.
Since we last met, I’ve seen the magical:
a love revived, a self remade. A song
has taken root and flowered, radicles
drilled deep into my heart, blooms opened long
and lush. Its current shakes me. I could wait
for it to sweep me downstream and away
from that which ails me, succumb to my fate.
But I am loath to go. I brave the days
I needn’t fear. I once cowered at chance.
Today, I sing along. I learn to dance.