After the break-up

Mind moves in mysterious ways – at least mine seems to. The Daily Post writing challenge suggested “and now for something completely different” and although they cannot be held responsible, I found myself writing a longer than usual poem, on a subject about which I usually keep quiet.

After the break-up

Some day
I will tell my sons
about their father.
That was a man
many years my husband,
you would think
this is a known tale.
You would think
they would know anyway.
Maybe they do.

Still I want my tale
to be told.
to come out of the darkness
and dreams wittering
their alternate universe
in my morning waking.
These knowings skitter
their return to the labyrinth,
hidden rats under
the rock of consciousness.

I will ask the wind
to tell my tale.
Gentle breeze slithering
sussurating leaves,
coolness brushing my hair.
All around, the sound
feeling its way
among the trees,
pale undersides of leaves
talk each to each other.

“It is there you know.”
“It is there”
The grass lies below
jealous of sky.
“Oh but we’ll go there”
“When will you go?”
“Wait, wait for the wind.”
Feel him blow.
The wind promises,
a whisper of air.

Breath of rush
and rage and storm.
From east or west
gusted dangerous twister
quarrelling harm.
The wind will take
all difference,
all tales of difference
With indifference.
The wind can’t tell my tale.

I will ask the sun
To tell the story.
I can feel pink light
through closed eyelids.
Vision rose-coloured
I entered unseeing,
unthinking, feeling only.
Even the hairs on my arm
stretched warm
in his glory.

In strong sun
shining glare or warmth
waves of fire
and passion hide
derision’s winter.
Who looks with open eyes
at the sun?
He stops me seeing.
Beyond heat
beyond hate, there is no story.

I will ask the sea
to bear my rhyme.
To take it as it comes
white caps crashing
splashing into heights,
then merging, melding
in smooth billows.
A sea of joy and tears
will not wallow
in the pettiness of bitterness.

The ocean has no time
to hear self-pity.
Raging, calm,
green flickered grey or black,
the words fall.
Ocean says
I have myriad magic voices.
I don’t tell tales.
I’ll keep them here,
deep in my forgetting.

Come ashore
Live on Earth.
Why on earth
should I want
to tell my sons
about their father?
He is.
There, not-there.
Walking, talking
in his own world.

Regret does not bruise him.
Joy does not choose him.
Strength and 
all his length of days
Cannot help me
Comprehend this ghost.
He comes from my own dreaming
Seeming real,
then gone, lost.
I stand on solid ground.

I lived with him,
and boys and joys.
There is no need
to tell my sons a tale.
I gave to him,
He gave to me,
Together.
We knitted
the threads of their life.
They live their own story.