What we leave behind
is not nothing.
It’s a haze around the morning sun.
It’s an unexpected change in direction of the wind.

It’s one frequency in the white noise
of those who came before,
undecipherable static in the background
of the lives of those still in the world.

It’s a shadow in the corner of the wall
in the room where our sons and daughters live.

It’s a small but persistent presence
that shapes what becomes
as surely as hope shapes the coming day.

– Ken Long