Hearts & Flowers

There has been no time in my
life to stop and count
the clouds
no time to look at
photographs to speak of
all the things I have not seen
and have not done
and have not been
nor all the people in
the chain that forged
us:  faces in boxes
with no names:  no
lips left to tell them.

There has been no time
in my life for paper
flowers and painted
hearts, for scrapbooks
which I did not do -
for tickets which I did
not keep and concert
stubs I now forget -

there was no time to talk,
years ran like water from
a tap and by the time
I heard and felt them
the fount was dry and
silence fell - the house
scraped clean and bare
by absence and last days
I did not sense, and less,
knew what to do, went by.

I do not have a lofted trunk
with painted scrolls and
my name on the lid -
nothing real to put inside -
namesakes, keepsakes,
all ran through my
fingers like the falling rain.

I do not have the words
to tell of width of soul
and depth of heart - of 
sorrow, the endless place
	of trying, of my part.
It was too busy, crammed,
and quick, to stand,
make bread, eat, and
talk, too full of doing
to take a breath and
stop.

Now, too late, with all
the moments, special
chances, lost, I still
am travelling
with no time to count the
clouds and fleeting
chances in the open air
to breathe and be -
	and they are not -
the ones I want with me.

previous poem

next poem