Classic Poem

You return to the stupa, yearly,
to seek your return. You wish to
come back as forest deer but
that deer is extinct. The stupa is a rock
upon which your dreams founder,
yearly, - you return that which
you do not have. Meanwhile, in the
West, under ragged skies and beneath a
hundred spires no longer dreamt of -
attendance comes tumbling down;
each stone, unturned, in an emptied
space within a space caved under.