Unspoken Words to the Dying,

 

There are some griefs so loud
They could bring down the sky,
And there are griefs so still
None knows how deep they lie,
Endured, never expended.
~May Sarton, "Of Grief," A Durable Fire, 1972

 

 

When my father was diagnosed with stage 3 lung cancer, my stepmom could not bear for him to be told.  I am not entirely sure how he was in the dark of it all, but we continued with the façade that there was hope, and hence words that needed to be spoken that would have been obvious of what was happening were never said.

 One day on morphine and nearer to passing, my dad was hallucinating as only a very logical engineer could have done.  He would very matter of factly ask me, “do you hear that music?”  or “Do you see that car moving in the painting?”  When I answered with a bewildered no, he remained silent and unfazed.  I cannot help but think that music is something that crosses the border of here and heaven.  He was hearing the echoes of where he was headed.  Some sounds preach truth no matter what secrets may be kept. That is my thoughts on it and like the hope for miracles, that is what I choose to hold on to. 

 

I kept words folded and starched in an innermost closet like formal attire for a place I would never be able to go.

 You see, one cannot dance at the reception hall if the building has been burned to the ground.

Yet, still I dance alone with a grace that loneliness carries.

Swaying with words that know how to move in my company but never step out of that room.

It sounds absurd to someone else, but I know where they stand and why.

And I listen because I need to.

For I must remember, and I shall!

I smoke them like a joint.

Holding my breath hard as I wait for something more.

But there was a time that I was the voice that carried high, like a song reaching for broader skies.

Now my heart is a nightbird; still and quiet in the daylight.

You say I look brave and sure like a train to the city, but don’t be fooled my dear!

I am thoughts unspoken and dubious.

The regret of a thousand backward falls.

I am an old frayed ribbon from the gift of memory of long long ago.

Just one hard pull and I could break.

Linking with Shay's Word Garden (Janis Ian is the featured poet and singer/songwriter)

& the Sunday Muse for Muse #244

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Hunters of Truth

Linking with the Sunday Muse for Muse # 90

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“They seemed to be staring at the dark, but their eyes were watching God.”

~ Zora Neale Hurston

The poet’s heart is a fox that sees the world in darkness and in light

his eyes pregnant with possibilities and yet empty from the fight

It is an inner struggle to recollect and yet a hunt that drives him further from his home

A quest into the wilds of hunger among the many creatures yet still alone

You see life is sharpened arrows yet doves that shall fly far beyond harms way

It is the winds of a thousand storms, but one companion that keeps him safe

All the beauty within starlight and the hurt that blinds him from the seen

Are the questions that keep him hunting for a reason to believe

For the poet is a dreamer that ponders meaning while searching for hope in flight

And he hunts the darkest of forests longing to capture the truest light.

The Art of Living

Photography by Ali Falak Image source

Linking with the Sunday Muse for Muse # 70

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Truth is the daughter of Time. ~Aulus Gellius

I used to long to dream in color

for I lived in a black and white world

all the edges of my day

 were cut like diamonds in a card board box

that had no cracks big enough

to let in the light

since then I have learned

 the art of living is a slow lesson

and sometimes what we learn

takes days that blend into years

to finally understand and truly see

to live you must be willing

to first face the truth

 then accept what is before you

and forgive what is in the past

it is a process of movement

letting go and moving on

brush strokes of beauty

do not come from still hands

most lessons are better learned

by doing

and no one else can do it for us

Silence Has a Blackness

Photo by Isabella Mariana from Pexels

Linking with the Sunday Muse for Muse # 49

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There are times when silence has the loudest voice. ~Leroy Brownlow

I was raised in a house

that made more sounds

 than the voices that it held

 creeks in the night 

whistling windows

steps that whined louder

 than a child wanting more

old secrets walked the rooms

with colorful voices

that only faith and children

could truly see

silence has a blackness

darker than coal

but it always catches the light

brightly once truth has a chance to shine.

©Carrie Van Horn 2019

To Comfort the Soul

The Mag #243

"Truth isn't always beauty, but the hunger for it is."

~ Nadine Gordiner

I have always longed for a great love
 to comfort my soul.
 One that would nourish
 every need inside and out.
 Inspire the best and with grace
 make the worst disappear.
  A devotion that would
 cradle like a soft crocheted sock
 and protect my very stance
 from the greatest of stumbling.
 Yet, in my search what I have truly found is

 that the only one that can fulfill
 these needs within my soul is God,
and in my foolishness I reach out to man,
again and again at no avail.
It is in the hard fall
that I find the comfort of God.

Road Map of the Soul

painting by Andrew Wyeth

The Mag # 178

"The windows of my soul I throw
Wide open to the sun."

~John Greenleaf Whittier, My Psalm

We must truly bear our soul butt naked to the world

 if we want to behold truth's vision upon our path.

Yet we shroud it with robes and veils like Muslims do a girl,

suffocating the bosom of all the answers we ever longed to have.

For a welcomed visitor cannot enter into a fortress locked up tight,

nor can a wealth of knowledge be payd for by bounty of the poor.

Yet we search for fulfillment with eyes that have no sight

trying to attain an answer we keep holding hostage for a cure.

This life is a journey that each soul must ride solo with no map

 and the directions cannot be given at the nearest corner store.

So we chase meaning unknowing to what lies ahead and what has passed

for our quest for purpose is not found beyond the horizon but at soul's core.

It Was A Beautiful Sloppy Mess

It Must Be Time For Lunch Now, 1979, by Francesca Woodman

The Mag #137

"Truth isn't always beauty, but the hunger for it is."  ~Nadine Gordimer

When I was a child

 I spooned life in

like banana pudding

never caring how much

spilled on my hands and face.

I took in all the answers

like a hungry lover

longing for her love's

next embrace.

My quest for truth and meaning

was enduring

yet clumsy

 with an awkward flair

I chewed up all my questions

with my mouth wide open

and crumbs wild in my hair.

Yet somewhere between

life's wonderful lunches

 and disappointment's feast

I lost my unkept hunger

and grew fat on complacency

learning to be discreet.

A Certain Starvation

Photo credit: Bob Adelman, 1965

The Mag #106

"You don't have a soul.  You are a Soul.  You have a body."  ~C.S. Lewis

 

We live in a world full of antidotes and answers

there is a soup for every meal of the week

and a cream for every wrinkle and bulge on your skin

a diet for every body type known to man

we have vaccines for many illnesses that once took lives

and a cure for sleepless nights and many mental disorders

a self help book for every subject you can think of

a clinic around every corner and a church down each block

yet there is still an epidemic running rampant across the country

our souls have been abandoned in the process

and are starving for the nourishment

that only God's truth can provide.

Freedom Is A Room With A View

Magpie #24

Silence and denial lay together like an unused bed, in an empty room. 

Never allowing truth's purspose, and it's freedom to be viewed.

I spent years laying in that bed waiting for him to become a better man, somehow free.

It was a costly lesson to finally realize the only one I could truly change was me.

For there are times it is strength to linger within the flame,

but there are others when it is mightier to stand up and walk away.

Magpie Tales a great site for writers. 

A Wasp In The Open Window,

Like a wasp in the open window beating upon the upper plated glass, we are not always certain we have ventured off the beaten path.
Yet, unlike the clever wasp whose instinct helps him to get free, we can stumble across the truth and still not realize what we have seen.
For ignorace is silent like the anxious lightning beats the thunder,uttering not a sound. So do we, travel through life unaware we are lost, until we have been found.