poem: “you’ll never know how all this time”

Ordinarily I don’t publish so much poetry at Theoria-press, and instead try to provide mostly essays with an odd poem or sonnet occasionally interspersed among them. But the Muse’s visits have outstripped my ability to keep pace with prose pieces so readers who prefer essays should peruse the archives of this site, which are replete with them.

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YOU’LL never know how all this time I’ve tried
you'll never know the seas that I have crossed
when I would instead have wished my face to hide
when I believed that everything was lost

I girded up myself with coats of strength
when I hardly had the strength to put them on
I’ve soldiered on through this entire length
from day to night, again from dusk to dawn

but now I falter and my steps grow weak
my strength begins to flag, my pace grows slow
I fail to find the words I wish to speak
and so I fear therefore you'll never know...

dear one, I pray you look into my eyes
and hearken to the words I wish to say
I see now, understand, and I realize
what you have suffered all along the way

believe me when these words to you I speak
at no time were your efforts lost on me
I never once believed that you were weak
nor do I once expect you’ll ever be

but grace will bear you up if you should fall
if on stone, your heart be dashed and shatter
the scattered shards: angles recollect them all
and draw together all the cordial matter

recompose, beatify, re-enthuse
impart a temperate rhythm and a song
the very love you feared that you could lose
streamed through you from beyond you all along

a power of life that never did belong
to us, from us never can be taken
when we believe the upward path too long
in our belief alone we are forsaken

our life is light, the dawn begun to break
that stirs our hearts, and they begin to ache
life invites us from the dark our leave to take
life incites us, through it, to awake

Photo by Jordan Wozniak on Unsplash