You know, I always found myself bound
and shackled by the heavy wrought-iron chains
of memory’s making, shining and untarnished
tying me to the past, yanking me back.
but now I see the chains unattached, self-made
and draped only around me, increasingly
smudged, tarnished, and rusting – decaying every time I so much
as lay a finger on them, they would undoubtedly deteriorate
into dust if I ever tried to grasp them firmly in my empty
hands.
But what I wanted to say to you? Maybe you
never stood beside me on that dew-strewn soccer field at all.
Maybe your arm on my young shoulders protected a sister,
nothing more.
Maybe your eyes – the color of tree bark, or cinnamon
now – then resembled dirt. Maybe your words never danced
in my ears, but instead stung my brain with not-understood
implications. Maybe you lack the grandeur,
the luster, that I so willingly form you with,
that I fail to picture you without now.
What I actually wanted to say to you? I hope your seam
sewing, glass blowing sk