DARKEST NIGHT
- 18 hours ago
- 1 min read
By Alice Hatcher
We weep at memories of misted fiddleheads,
the milkweed seats of chrysalid kingdoms,
sacred scrolls of silver birch roseate at dawn,
glacial till of pungent loam and marbled stone,
gardens seeding themselves in endless resurrection,
all the nectar of mottled fruit we found wanting.
We walk accursed in wilderness, across barren
plains, through scabrous lands and bedeviling dust.
Gloaming is too soft a word for sudden nightfall,
the world’s hard turn into uncharted desert—for
our blind descent into the soul’s darkest night.
We thirst for meaning and find our wells dry, oases
forsaken by incautious souls weary of guarding water.
Moisture evaporates from our skin and dissipates,
vanishes like prayers passing through parched lips
and falling silent beneath a starless sky.
We journey without compass, adrift on a sea of sand,
seeding impossible dreams with memories of home:
the sustenance, and torment, of exiles. We follow
dry riverbeds and dream of luminous streams.