DOWN DOWN Poem by Dane Zajc

when I think about all your hopes
etched in your footsteps
I follow them
the footsteps that suddenly
sink into fog and mud
and damp cold

when I expect you and you come
and sit quietly by me
and I ask Is everything, everything gone
In a flash, you say, in an insane
instant it went down down
it vanished
I think of you coming with legs
corroded from a traitorous journey
and I see no reflection of your eyes
and I watch the heavy clouds falling
over the sharp-edged cliffs
and hear the spruce tips piercing
the bellies of a dark wind.