1 post / 0 new
399th Weekly Poetry Contest honorable mention: Souls do not die

by Mohamed Sarfan

I. Soul-Searching
Today was dark and your pictures were gone,
And my memory failed with your image;
It seems time and space ran to an unspoken place,
And left me to grieve without visage.
The tears they just come because that’s what they do
And my heart still feels like it is breaking;
The pain in my chest is like a noble arrest,
Until I understand it’s of your making.
But no one believes it; they just can’t conceive it,
The unknown is enveloped with fear;
If only they knew what this spirit has been though
To pierce the thin wall of the “Here.”
The present it is – to the past and it gives,
Some souls recognition of the wrath;
That we feel on this earth, when death comes to curse
Our hearts so deeply entwined ‘til the last.
Some will deny it and many can’t buy it,
But when it’s quiet, you may hear your name whispered,
And believe it’s a mirage, an auditory barrage;
An un-validated spirit’s existence.
For we know when it’s true and will attest without a clue,
The essence of those that our hearts have allowed;
Until comes the day, above all earthly dismay,
We meet on the other side of the lightened shroud.
When those bumps in the night, or a side-glance brings fright,
Or, the technology is newly amiss
I know it is you, just trying to come through,
Your soul’s rendition of a kiss

II. Swan Song of a Soul
Some days i don't know if i’ll go,
But i don’t know how she can stay
The heat is too hot and the pain too wrenching
As it melts my soul away

To draw a breath and then think of death
Is a strange idea to relate
For how can one, who cannot overcome
Inspire within such a state

And the happy days, seem so far away,
When there is laughter that veils a frown
It’s funny to me, that a smile of glee,
Can cover a mask of down

And i've thought of the ways, and it turns into days
When i considers the options that be,
But i don't take a step, lest i prematurely be met
With the reapers grasp upon me.

Sure, i go and i talk, and i relate all the pain
Which goes back to my childhood days
There was something amiss, in a whirlwind that persists
Which held my happiness at bay.

And i turned to chemical comfort, after trying to stuff
All the sadness that was inside
And it robbed me of life, after years of strife
And i continued on the painful ride

Anything was better, sure any drug could fetter
A different me to show the world
As if i was acceptable, or worthy or credible
To be part of their lives, unfurled

Well, it sometimes gets better, then clouds up, seems forever
The me that i see in the glass
If only i could love her, embrace the soul above her
i might save this little girl from the past

I cannot speak to what the future holds
But i do so wish i could know …
what becomes of the past in tomorrow’s looking glass
Is only as the wind blows …

And she mustered her courage, battened down not to perish
And saw the storm through to the last …
She learned that the beauty she could now see through the pain
Was her soul’s swan song of the past …
***

399th Weekly Poetry Contest