5. What Do You Mean, Never?
The Whisper. The hardest one to edit so far. And reall you shouldn't edit poetry, but there was something there, it's still not fully formed, but it's coming. This was written after she died.
The Whisper
One for the other,
it’s not a fair trade.
If I give up the one
I’ll never have it again
and I can’t bear it
so I tighten my grip
and hang on for dear life
as if life is so dear
hanging on so tightly
and so full of fearBut softly
in the distant,
unknowable mind
through mists and myths
of possession and time,
there’s a whisper
that belongs to me if I seek it
a whisper that lives
with me like a secret.
It’s gleaming and fresh
and what you wanted
It's the root before us
It's the root before all
It's what’s most painful
the refused call
and there it does stay
to maybe be glanced upon
like a picture
hung on the wall
the most beautiful thing
a reminder of what
we’ve always been.I’ve looked long enough
taken pleasure
and comfort
this whisper, without you
now has come time.So Sally I trade one for the other
I will not lament
you’ve taken my comfort
and I will listen again
to the depths of my soul
to the place that we saw
in each other unfold
to the place
we both kept alive
locked away
but as lovers did allow
the other to play.You whisper to me.
I will make the trade
I will embrace our whisper
through the sadness and pain
and into life bright
begin again.Edited but not finished – 1/27/24
Edited 2/10/24