Silence Falls December 22, 2009
Silence falls.
Tumbling down the stairs,
with nary a sound,
head over heels.
She loved me.
But I did not know it.
Not that I was blind,
but more that I simply didn’t see.
A sneaking suspicion.
A nudge of the mind.
A nagging reminder
of something not yet forgettable.
Yet in the end the world spun on.
This globe continued to turn.
Spinning at 10,000 miles an hour.
Round and round. And round and round.
I have found myself at long last:
contented,
happy,
joyful.
Hereupon Christmas Day.
A pagan holiday, once. Perhaps.
But masterfully reallocated by the Church.
Celebrate not your old holiday, but ours instead.
Marketing 101.
Fifteen hundred years ago, or so.
So they said to the Celts back then.
The Christmas tree, the star, Bethlehem.
Let the myths merge together:
truth and beyond truth.
Threads running together
like a river, shining gold.
The starlight reflecting upon the water.
The sunset radiant in the glass.
A smile upon her lips.
Delight dancing within her eyes.
Her hair flying out behind her,
and one adventurous strand
always getting in her eyes.
Yet with the smallest of smiles
she brushes it away
with a fair delicate finger.
Can such a creature yet be human?
But of course, therein lies the beauty.
The song crescendos.
He turns the radio’s volume down.
But no matter, the music is louder still.
The radio itself begins to dance the tune.
What if we lived in a world there was poetry
in every deed, in every action, in every word?
Where everything done and undone and not done
had deep meaning, mystery, and truth?
Perhaps we do live in such a world.
In a world where there is joy in everything.
Even in the bitterest of sorrows, death,
there always is a sweetness at the end.
For death is merely a passage:
a pause between acts two and three.
Two and three, you ask?
One was before birth, you see.
For it can be also said,
much like it is with death,
that no one has ever come back
from beyond birth.
No baby has ever revisited the womb
and assured those as yet within that warm confine,
that indeed there is life, so rich, so true,
on the other side of birth.
Perhaps it is much the same with life after death.
Something so beyond comprehension that it cannot be shared:
only experienced, at the appropriate time.
But enough talk of death and dying, today is Christmas.
A holiday built upon a particular birth:
the birth of one who himself would conquer death.
And banish its power over mankind (and womankind too)
forever and ever, past the end of time itself.
On such a date there is a moment for joy.
A happiness fully radiant, a shining moment,
as the star shone above the manger,
brighter than any ever had in the night before.
And so it is that perhaps she loved me.
And perhaps I simply did not see, and I am sorry.
For I did not mean that she suffer a tear at my expense,
but in the same breath I can only find joy.
For what lies ahead gives me hope, faith, and courage.
To experience all that life has to offer:
all the joy, love and truth…
There is so much to see, there is so much to feel.
I find myself walking in a dance.
A spring, indeed, in my step.
Even though I write these words but a few days
after the winter solstice.
And I find at last that this poem has poured itself out.
My fingers flying over the white keyboard upon which I write.
Streams of words cascading from thought to emacs;
the laptop’s quiet hum a comfort.
Let there be light.
And there was light.
Both in the day
and in the night.
And my soul shines:
your light, not mine.
But I no longer have aspirations to
generate my own light.
Quite contented am I now.
I have finally found myself as I am:
human.
All that and nothing more.
In that lies a liberation.
Therein lies the seed of peace.
For you clothed yourself with your creation.
Became human, as it were, over two thousand years back.
And I can only aspire
to follow your teachings,
to heed your wisdom,
and to share your love with all whom I meet.
The lion and the lamb.
The strong and thus the gentle.
The raging rawness of power itself.
And the gentle warm wet nuzzling of soft comfort.
In such duality I find myself a pupil.
My eyes wide open, learning much.
And the softest of smiles forms on my face.
Yet it ever grows stronger, breaking into a grin.
Laughter wells up within me.
It is as with Gandalf at the end of the Third Age.
A vast repository of mirth resides in my soul.
I find myself joyful at being joyful.
My eyes dance, they sparkle.
Bright-eyed and bushy-tailed,
joy itself bubbling over.
Happiness, contentedness at being alive at Christmas.
This is no subtle smile:
a mere curve of the lips, no more,
where yet so much emotion is conveyed.
Nay, this is laughter out loud.
A veritable LOL.
Perhaps a prelude to ROFL.
But not quite ROFLMAO,
As I’d rather not laugh that off.
Thus may this poem, an onslaught of words,
longer than most I’ve found myself to write,
ironically titled, perhaps,
close by simply wishing you and yours:
A merry Christmas.
A merry Christ mass.
A merry time for you and yours.
And please, do please, share the love.