Battle

Easy

Tell me that it’s easy,
To rise up each morning at the break of dawn
To set your knees in that spot in the mat
With the perfect grooves made from wear;
A testament to the consistency with which they carry
The weight of your desperation and dreams.

Tell me how you’ve gotten used to the familiar aches –
The pain of the strain of holding a position
That under different circumstances would be called corporal punishment;
Hands clasped underneath chin,
Elbows scraping the edge of the bed…
But none of these compare to the aches
That rampage in places the eye cannot see;
None of these compare to the screams that no ear hears –
None, except One.

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Gratitude, Always

It’s a minute to midnight,
I’m watching the clock tick-tock its way to a new dawn;
Trying to capture the exact moment of the transition;
This wouldn’t be my first attempt,
Though each time I’d managed to miss the tangibility
Of that sharp dividing line separating old from new.

Sometimes I wish everything would come to a standstill –
A moment of silence to acknowledge the passing of a season.
Sometimes I wish there would be a tremor
Through the fabric of existence,
To signal the birth of a new cycle.

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A Father’s Loss (I)

Each night as we slept the tears flowed.
I can’t deny that it shows –
The pain we’ve been hiding.
How do we say goodbye?

I can ignore your feet on my table, darling;
But not the name you keep calling
Every night when you moan…groaning till waking, saying;
‘Ah, Adriel, my little baby…why won’t you come to Mummy?’
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