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Balachandran V
The pain comes much later, first
in trickles, then in torrents
Washing off, cleansing
Wounds, hurts, the memories
The thoughts of should-haves
and should-have-nots.
First to heal are those
festering, anger for
What they did -
and did not.
Then, those of regret
of what you did -
and did not.
Then, like a sunbeam
breaking out through the clouds
The realization that everything
In an opal dream cave I found a fairy:
Her wings were frailer than flower petals,
Frailer far than snowflakes.
She was not frightened, but poised on my finger,
Then delicately walked into my hand.
I shut the two palms of my hands together
And held her prisoner.
I carried her out of the opal cave,
Then opened my hands.
First she became thistledown,
Then a mote in a sunbeam,
Then--nothing at all.
Empty now is my opal dream cave.
There is a question that I ask,
And ask again:
What hunger was half-hidden by the mask
That he wore then?
There was a word for me to say
That I said not;
And in the past there was another day
That I forgot:
A dreary, cold, unwholesome day,
Racked overhead,--
As if the world were turning the wrong way,
And the sun dead:
A day that comes back well enough
Now he is gone.
What then? Has memory no other stuff
To seize upon?