Gwydion's Loss of Llew

by Ellen Kushner

When I came to the house

You were gone from the hall.

Your cup and knife-handle were cold to touch.

The leaf-red fire warmed no one's hands.

No harpstring trembled of your passing.

The bowstring was long lax.

No one sang in the house,

And when I set my ears into the wind of the hall,

All I could hear was,

I am cold  . . . I am cold  . . .

It is October.

In the hills it was the same.

I know you loved them,

The crisp, clear trees,

Each with its own color,

Its own pattern twisted in the branches.

You have not seen them this year;

Though they are each as tall and straight as you,

Their numbers as great as your soul,

Yet you are not among them.

The wind tangles the net of branches

That holds it and cannot hold it;

The wind tangles the web

Of color stroked with black,

Lashing it across the sky.

My feet catch on ground-fruit,

Roots, dropped branches, brittle leaves.

If you are up there among the leaves

I cannot tell

If you have become the many

If you are the one—

Then the wind blows the net open

And all I see is sky.

Oh, Llew, be not gone from me!

I would renounce them,

Wind, leaf, and tree

If I could find you

In a place where nothing grows.