Reverberations

Descendants of an aftermath.

When the smoke cleared, we left what was left of the temples and abandoned our sacrificial cups. No longer painting the chapel walls, we made canvases of our skins, our creed now take this body, and we gave it up. Nothing could save us, and we carried this truth as a torch foisted before our faces, marching into the long night. We were something else now, wild, painted creatures of flesh and word, with no more monuments to shield us from the elements that mocked our feeble forms. An awareness grew, of an element breathing among us as we moved, but we would no sooner mark this with a sign than claim the wind.

Aftermath

In the dark between destruction and rebirth.

After the promise, before the fallen fruit, love was so loud that what followed might be called nature’s reproach. We suspected it was. But our memories of watercolor flights stayed anyway between water and sky, and us gliding in wide-winged pelican formations­­––long after their welcome, ignoring the new signs warning against the trespass of our breath.

After the storm, our eyes fall into these empty hands and roll across the wreckage around us until they are soaked in the sludge of charred remains. 

Only this silent plea between us now, strong and invisible; and time no longer ours, and in the dark hours before dawn, it may echo an inquiring trinity, Love, will you make the world here again? and then Hear, again and Love, here.