Terms of Surrender

Terms of Surrender
Originally uploaded by MontanaRaven.

Terms of Surrender

We hide in the dead grass.
Heat makes the rocks tremble.
Before night rescues us we have
accepted the terms: crawled
lied, cheated ~ lived.

We take what the world gives.
We bow our heads like flowers
and think of the ways we came.
Before sleep each night we put
our mouths against a clod
and breathe our share of common air ~

The truest way there is to say God's name.

Poem by William Edgar Stafford