Sunday, September 9, 2012

Remember


I. 

Some say,
When you find yourself
in darkness,
remember, it’s your choice.

 
I say,
What planet
can resist rotation?

 
How quickly
earth revolves
day into night. 

II. 

Memories must be mined
and stoked like coals
 

No use are they
hidden deep within the earth
we all become
 

Perhaps they’re right that
if we wake before the dawn
we will remember
all it lights.
 

III. 

Oswiecim
is one of many
Polish names
for murder

by no choice of
my foremothers.
 

Here burned innocence
stoking absence
scorched into the soil.
 

And yet the sun still rises
over fields of
hopeful cornflowers
 

So very long I’ve remembered
this particular darkness
in which I never lived. 

 
IV. 

So finally one morning
I inhaled beauty
like they in all
that dust did faith

My arms outstretched,
hope rising from city streets,
wires slicing through
a tentative prayer. 

 
V. 

Perhaps the answer,
is so simple: 

Speak love
in any language
no matter what
the time of day. 

And yes,
even when it must
be whispered.
 
 
 
Copyright September 2012

No comments: