Cold Prayer for the Wounded

Originally written in November 2005, this revised poem attempts to capture the bitter sense of disillusionment when someone we loved, or thought we did, falls from the pedestal.

Cold Prayer for the Wounded   (Revision of original poem dated November 2005) 08.25.14

Driving home, I bid farewell to the rosy-peach cloud

And watched it fade into the dusk of an early winter’s eve.

I prayed that my love for you would dissolve like that cloud,

To leave my soul intact.

 

Your exodus was your own design as you avoided life and

Hunkered down into the vast shelter of your wound.

I mused on all the angry reasons why I needn’t miss you;

But tears grazed my cheek as if in silent retaliation.

 

To love our wounded brothers is a God-driven gift,

Yet I continue to rage at the cuts you cannot heal,

And for the lingering love that burns still:

Flames flicker ‘round my heart.

 

Despite the pain, my fiercer nature cries:

Wound yourself!

The flames are dying now.

An ember cannot scar.