A house in which no one lives Any more. Dead sere leaves Floating, spent, on a pool Of autumn rain. Shut windows, Reflected in the parking Reserved for a pastor Who suffered from cancer, And passed away: whose wife, Now the pastor, struggles With health, herself. What was once live, and green, and young Passes into the waiting arms Of mortality. There remains, only, the hope That the cycle will start Once again, and the sap will rise In a new spring, a house alive With a family, and the parishioners Renew their faith.