This is haunting, Nick—not least, I think, because of the musical repetitions. Also, setting the leave-taking in the future somehow heightens the poignance. I wondered at first about the archaic “nigh” instead of “near,” but after you repeated it a few times, I found that haunting as well.
A few odds and ends:
You don’t need to capitalize “autumn” in S5 and S6 or “night heron.” I’m not sure why the latter is so often capitalized on the Internet, but you wouldn’t capitalize “nightingale,” so …
In S5 and probably S3, “summers” needs an apostrophe.
There’s probably more you could do to vary or jazz or slant or trim the language, but others are better qualified to give you that kind of advice. I felt this poem.
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Threaded Mode
