The Hope that Follows Darkness
the balance tilts in a pairing of prose poems
(One: Waiting)
Once a turtle crossed the road right here, ahead of a boy who brandished caution, and once, late at night, when I should not have been alone but was, a cauldron of deer steamed apart to let me pass, lanterning me home with their eyes. But only today
do I turn from this road and walk between walls and through gates so that I might stand in the rooms of the dead. Someone has caressed eight graves with wreathes, and someone has not forgotten Mother, and no one has come for the family of six who did not survive the Civil War. It is winter,
bitter cold, and I step lightly, beneath trees, beside stones, among the long lost to speak to the newly parted, to honor losses that may not be assessed or measured, only felt. Waiting for the turtle, for the boy, for deer, for caution. Listening for the groan of the earth beneath tree and stone and bone.
(Two. There Will Be Another Spring)
There will be another spring. The overwintered bulbs have begun to crack and send up early measures, and the sleeves of forsythia that you soaked in your tub grew buttons of yellow that bloomed. It just took hoping for—the painted birds, the worms after rain, the humanity of bees, the sun on the bark of the birch that turns the color white
to amber. The balance tilts—fewer words than scenes—and green is antidotal, and old lovers linger longer over that which was taken and not taken. That which is lastingly dark is not, as it turns out, eternal. There’s more of morning, more of the afternoon, and while snow is still a possibility, so are tulips. I am working on becoming someone who is in need
of less forgiveness, and I’ll want my hands for that, my eyes. I’ll want more sleep, which I shall find, and if the hawk comes again to my garden to visit I will not interrupt him with my questions, for we all worship weather in our own way, and stories, in the end, cannot be bargained for. Nothing’s enough
and everything must be. It will be another year til winter.
“That which is lastingly dark is not, as it turns out, eternal.” Thank you for this. This will go in my journal as words of hope. Never doubt words have power, as these worlds traveled to me and gave me renewed strength for tomorrow.
This, a balm for my soul this morning, a slowing of breath, the calming I feel when I sink my hands into loamy soil and nestle a bulbous tulip.
"...stories, in the end, cannot be bargained for. Nothing’s enough and everything must be." There's a quiet ache, a necessary resignation there for me.