To Capture


     So they come they go they talk they.......
tease,
     so they come they go they never
know the anguish, never know the
longing held in solitary, never understand
the steal,

     oh for five just to be
back before this self that once
was owned but, as lonesome,
     only an inept eternity that
spans all vacant dimension - known futility;
has every clock stopped,

     'I sit watching the second hand
move an integral mass, where a torrent
of tears over a day lives between each tick,
     each, tock, each slow, slow, increment -
increasing pain to add sweat to tears,
     sorrow to breath, death, to.............

     There lives upon a time,
a far away day, a far away place
that graced a heart - abundantly
with a strength, a passion to gorge
you a meadow filled with children
     to play, children to smile,
children to love, children, of life.

     I be there with you, singing
songs of blue skies that have all upon
a May-pole while the crystal, iced lemonade
     cools to quench every child's thirst in joy,
and then to dance, and dance, and dance - till
an evening has all around a fire for hopes
     of wonder, as stories part a day re-claimed
for sleep to Spring the dreams of cherubs -
safely held.

     Before all war,
the day never needed a claim -
     for all was ours, and theirs,
and the birds, the flora, the trees,
the skies and yonder, every cloud
painting shapes of beasts to wonder
     and there in every childs eye,
          the spark!

     upon our now,
our present, heads go by stooped,
sorrowed, certain of only a grey
horizon, a grey dawn and dusk,
     a grey future and thier only
escape, a box of crayola, every slim
waxed inconsequence coloured only, grey.

     'I beg of you, see not this mask that silently
screams beneath, please please I beg, in passing
are you alive - if so, take five, just take five
     of time beyond the stolen past,
just five, just five - for a meadow filled
with seasons of wonder and fertility - each one,
present beyond nine months of nurture and harvest,
     each one, a future claimed where passage of time;
     no longer a concern but, the place of freedom,

we all, were meant, to be.'

Michael J Waite 20th of May 2020 - Dedicated to my wife, and all; knowing what is being stolen, and lost, and gone forever.