I Am...

I Am...
A woman,
With a full heart, hidden
Somewhere in an empty room...
With eyes not quite of autumn's gold, and yet
Neither all of summer's green;
I wonder...
If love is a tale made for children --
A granting of sweet dreams in their innocence --
A honey--coating to help their throats
Choke down the bitter draught...
I hear...
A voice that whispers warnings, half-formed,
Bodiless as hope, until I swear I cannot draw
Another breath unless this spectre be unmasked,
His lies mangled 'neath my righteous tread;
I see...
A woman, proud, uncompromising,
Diaphanous as air -- less, even, than the tears
That fall in desolation about her weary feet,
Salt poison pooled upon the withered ground...
I want...
A measure of quietude, a certain silence,
The echo of alone which heals me of dreaming,
The nothing that stills the wanting,
The numb, the cold that laughs at pain;
I am
A woman,
hidden...
I pretend...
That I can live forever -- that Time
Has no puissance but that which I afford Him --
And so, I can wait, I can be happy tomorrow,
Sleep is for the dead, but its ghosts haunt my waking...
I feel..
Too much -- too deeply to be directionless,
Too real for imagining, and yet the familiar eyes
Hold nothing of recognition -- only my reflection --
A meeting of shadows in sunlit glass;
I touch...
The downy wings of hope, in wonder,
In reverence, in need, in hunger;
Alas, it burns my fingers as a flame,
A sacrilege, self-defined...
I worry...
That I am alone; that in my longing
I have forsaken all -- but oh, what reward,
What smile divine should light the path to freedom --
And how can I but heed the siren's call?
I cry...
For having too much, for fear of bursting,
And then, when by the pouring of my soul
I lie, a vessel emptied, I cry again
For what was had, and lost;
I am
A woman,
Empty...
I understand
That life is what you make it,
That sometimes, the coat of many colors
That marks your triumphs brightly, blends only
To loneliness of grey...
I say...
That we are made by life, shaped,
Broken, perhaps -- unmade and voided --
But always, the core of us remains, waiting
With only faith, with trust, to be reborn;
I dream...
Of bluest waters, reaching
With unnatural hands towards the faded sky,
Of dolphins that wander in seas without limits,
Carrying me water-breathing past corals and clouds...
I try...
To lead by example, knowing
That merely the telling holds no power;
A gift of giving is merely a day, while
A gift of knowing spans forever;
I hope...
That my darkness holds you gently,
That pain is halved by sharing, that feeling
Wields nothing past the words it summons,
Except that it touch you with only healing..
I am
A woman,
only.