Memory

Memory

You said, my friend, that I misunderstood you,

That night upon which hung our very future,

But all is not so simple as you say,

Of that my healing mind is ever certain. 

A lie hung in the air, of subtle making,

That tugged upon a wounded heart that missed you,

For if, you thought, your wishes came to light,

They flew before the face of my rejection. 

One road then ceased to be, and one we travelled,

That lead toward the cliff just out of sight,

Sped on by falsehood’s growing agony

That took its root within my fragile heart. 

That agony pressed then upon my mind,

As gradually its threads unravelled further,

Still driven in by flattering deception,

A word then lost among a hundred thousand. 

It sped us, then, towards our fated parting, 

My mind and memory were long since shattered,

And, as you rode off into distant sunset,

You left me here in pieces on the ground. 

But then, I saw the shapes of those who knew me

Descend upon the fragments of my substance, 

To mend together that which you had broken,

Unhaltingly, unfailingly they stayed. 

I came back to a mind I had forgotten,

A heart that once you shattered now was healing, 

New feelings came to me, or older memories,

Horizons I forgot I ever knew. 

And, as you told your friends I had destroyed you,

They looked to find the monster you described,

And howled their vengeful poison from the distance

Toward a fragment they could not discern. 

The swords came flying at me from the distance,

Some struck, some missed, as blood began to flow

From a heart that had not gathered yet its fragments.

Into the whole you saw that day we met. 

I pitied you that day, as you stood fighting

Against one whom you once professed to love, 

And shed a tear, not out of former darkness,

But out of kindness as I saw your hatred. 

Some future lies beyond the distant ether,

I search it nightly for some hidden sign,

And I wonder as I seek unwritten stories,

If yours will ever find its happiness. 

17/10/18