A tree of sadness and loneliness grows in you

curls its hankering roots about your precious calcium

as you stand, away from crowd, observing, disinterring

from the idea a melee is your place

for you have never commanded, nor sought, ownership

nor ever been wrapped softly in inclusion to watch

fireflies make feast of dark and bid magic come close

you who sewed sea pearls into days, till they lost their iridescence

needed but one thing

to be wanted; simple and pure like river water

for thirsty seeker will seem sweetest of all

and when you were not

you turned your loss toward others famishment

a spirit born out of the song of tremendous churning

for someone who suffers, can know best, those who also suffer

when need does not knock on your door and lay claim

go into the nacreous luster child, find the pain in others

suck it out as you would a poison from a beloveds finger

even as no beloved is yours to assume

for we are all a possessed league of runners

eventual grail unclear, burning air and time like spells

hoping someone will hear our unspoken cries

to count for something, for someone

laid gentle in aching marrow, as saffron

and plump sultana, bid color from nothingness

the best thing we can gift ourselves, is a rapture

from that terrible, infernal sprint of desolation

a fretteth slaving peace to chained wheel

and slowing down, listen to the breath within

an instrument mindful of jeweled error and delight

for that breath will one day cease

and join then, in leaving the body

all unchained quintessence beyond in twilight

where perhaps at last we will find

those of us who have searched so long

a way to belong.

(for S.P.)