A Birthday Poem by Gert Strydom

It’s full moon tonight
and yellow like Citrine
some golden rays
decent down to me
and it’s forty-five years
since my full moon first broke
in the dark onyx night.

The morning sun is ruby red
till it turns shining diamond bright
in a sapphire blue sky
and too intense to look at
and it’s forty-five years
since the first time
that I saw light.

The years flash past
and in this summer of my life
I wish that perennial
could my summer be,
but autumn has already
laid its hands on me
and there are grey specs in my hair.