Saturday, September 08, 2012

Broken Things (an original poem)


Tonight I feel like a cracked plate
Or a pitcher that won’t hold water.
I am trying to remember the beauty
Of broken things, of birds
With clipped wings, chipped shells
Whose wholeness I can only guess,
Small tiles whose pictures
Made from broken bits impress.
I am trying to remember the glass
I used to find, small and worn,
Rounded smooth to my hand,
And the tiny bits of rock and mica
In the sand ~ the way they sift
Through my fingers, gritty, sharp.
And in the fire’s ashes,
One gnarled string of a golden harp.

Tonight I feel like a piece of old chalk,
A pencil lead slipped from its point.
I am trying to remember the beauty
Of broken forms, of twigs
That snap in storms and lie there on
The ground, and brown leaves,
Paper thin and crumpled, that fall
With whispered sound. I remember cups
With missing handles and bells
That no longer ring and voices
So cracked and dry they can barely sing.
A brittle bit of bone, a sagging step,
A bedraggled hem, a shoe without a heel.
It seems to me I know just how
All these broken things must feel.

Tonight I can hardly recall what it means
To be whole ~ and yet, the form is there,
The full shape, the deep wellness of my soul.
I can not turn from the hands that know
Me best, know every hurt and broken place
And all my aching need for rest.
He loves me with a love that is unending,
Knows all my wretched, ragged rending.
He sees the way my broken self is tending.
And only he can move me toward his mending.

                                                ~EMP

1 comment:

Edna said...

Catching up on reading my blogs--really like this poem. I think we have all felt that way--at least I have!