In Highgate Wood

A flicker of sun through leaves in Highgate Wood,
this moment of recognition: I who know
no kin find myself open intently
in a willed, almost religious relinquishing,

as if to diffuse among this ceaseless play
some latent thing so near in me it asks
to be named all that I now forgo
as what it might have been: I say, 'My son.'
...