John deSouza

To know love, something made more painful,

more joyful, shared in the lived knowledge,

then this bitterness of my own making—Strung

now between worlds, empty shrouded shadow

weighs heavy on my shoulders with the shame of it,

carries behind me the outline of a love lost

over and again, mourned too eagerly in the singing.

My fingers tingle with it as my temples throb,

tuning my music to these same lyrics,

now that the season is suspended and with it

my voice desiccates to dust in darkness,

becomes less than the shadow of what once was light—

All love dwindles behind me, shrivels to bareness,

grief at what words can’t prevent, but crave,

a purpose that safeguards the color of what once

we enjoyed together. I hiss a curse at that unlit shade

and void that sucks back what had blossomed in me.

There is no end of it, worse than death, and yet

I will not lose its memory for that forgetfulness.