This is the time of the Cicada to me,
Though the tree leaves have already fallen this year.
A time of shedding the thin and fragile moult,
Which remains clinging to the branches, as if to hold on forever to something before.
This time of shedding is cold and dark and exposes my heart
To aspects that can never again be attained,
To periods that only remain silent movies running absently and repeatedly in my mind,
To the stripping of time.
Like the beautiful loquat branch which shaded the tin but has been trimmed away,
Like the 30 years of its strengthening growth hacked forever from my eyes in several Belabored moments,
To never be seen again —
Like a breath stolen,
To never be breathed again —
Perhaps like the shedding and the trimming away,
I too must shed these memory-remains,
I too must clear away that which shades the path before me,
And not turn from the open space
But embrace the absence of things,
Though the absence still pains me.
— Nicole Marie Moore