By: Sarah Rahmatullah
Blue dark sky, clouds on high,
dark as midnight ether.
City center, not one soul to enter,
except for a single person there.
Long coat masking tension,
wide-brimmed hat averting mention,
exhausted, misbegotten, and beleaguered,
so went that single figure.
City square laid with darkness and cobbles,
‘cross the way a park cloaked in shadows
beckoning, beckoning to our figure there.
Winding pathways, skeletal trees,
a breath of wind whispering, “This way, please.”
On, plodding on, went our figure, ensnared.
Then began to fall the rain
our figure kept on stepping in time to its own
dismal refrain.
One of dereliction, desolation.
Oh, with what fain would it do,
to escape that pain!
A curve in the path, a bend in the way,
The figure rounded it and lo!
What was that far away?
A single pinprick, a point of light,
piercing the deadness of the night.
Our figure’s cheeks flushed,
the eyes sparked with a new light.
To reach that glimmer our figure would walk,
would run, would fight!
With a step renewed with fresh vigor,
our figure headed toward that light, that trigger!
Nearer, ever nearer, drew it,
to that expanding glow, which directed it.
And there!
A single streetlamp, burning fair.
Tall, of wrought iron, wonderfully illuming,
to our figure, internal light was dawning!
A ribbon of wind, a hushed voice imparting,
“Welcome, weary one. For thirty days,
this light resounding,
waking sleeping ones, lost ones,
and those repining.
Rest in its radiance, and when it goes,
remember what it saw, what it told.”
And as our figure slipped off its coat,
from its heart sprang forth joy, and hope.
