Hanging over me with tales to tell,

of the agonies and ecstasies that I have felt,

to reach the goal I dream of yet today,

in passing shadow scenes that I replay.

I reach and grasp for its slowly slipping hand,

stretching myself through the pain I can withstand,

my fingertips to skim upon its golden edge,

denying all the aches my angry bones can dredge.

No, swathed in white I push on until the red,

succumbs to the light of the written words I’ve bled,

onto the empty paper, how they fight for space,

to tell the layered stories that only time can trace.

To the beginning buried deep inside of me,

striving to explain the world that I can see,

created in the storyteller’s rambling prose,

and the poet’s fleeting desire to compose.