Never Knowing...

​

Maybe everybody's been there, or maybe it's just that most everybody's been there. For those that have, you know the way of it.

There's some upheaval in your world, things suddenly change and maybe someone or something that you thought would be a permanent fixture in your life has disappeared, gone like blown out candlelight.

Now you ask yourself, "How did I lose this time? What am I searching for?"

There's many, many a person out there wandering about in their own wilderness of the soul, so to speak. 

 

Never Knowing...

I remember you from my future -

there was a room bathed in half - lit blue,

the sound of my heartbreaks past

and you.

 

“Who are you?” say I to you.

“Who are you?” asked you of me...

So, you turned

and fled among the pillars of future history...

 

In one of the days of my past

at a place in a space that did not last

I saw you

and at sometime in my future

I will know you...

 

I see your form now, flitting from darkness in time

but it - no, you

you - are so hard to discern in the misty semi - light

of days gone past and months to come...

 

“Who are you?” say you to me, “Where are you?” say I to you..

and again you run from me...

 

O, how desperate is the chase now - you; fleeing,

me; pursuing, ever pursuing

over moving hills, through shaded vales;

fearing to lose sight

of a translucent dream I follow...

 

could it be that you

are that one true answer

to questions often on my mind

yet never upon my lips.

I want to believe that you

 

are that one person

 

that one place

 

that one thing

 

that will justify this life I live,

what things I do...

and so

 

I chase the shadow of a cloud across an empty field

filled with the leavings of old and broken feelings

because I must have thee...must have you

 

Out of the shades and shadows

that lurk in the quiet corners of my mind’s eyes -

creeps a haunting hope

and a sneaking possibility that you

 

are what I have always,

 

and never

 

needed —

 

A pain, a hope - a desire

that I have always heard yet never heeded

an indistinct silhouette in and out of the mists of my past

a woman, a thing, a place that coalesces

out of the days of today’s time and dates

then, flies a farflung flight

into a tale of many tomorrows

 

I see your form, now, again

flitting from darkness to darkness in time

singing a soundless song that only these ears can hear within...

a lovely, lilting chanting of hopes and loves

few and far between

 

Are you a shadow shading

parts and parcels of my soul

as I silently seek a way

to become whole - a way

to hold on

to a dream

that could have been real

before the end

of a cold and golden day?

 

As I walk , I also run, I also cry

“Who Are you, and are you mine?” wondered I

but a sudden swiftness of your steps belie

that this is just

another reverie of fantasy as;

 

desperate is the chase now - you; fleeing,

me; pursuing, ever pursuing

over moving hills, through shaded vales;

fearing to lose sight

of a translucent dream I follow...

 

Your sweetly whispered words

“Who are you, my dear?”

that reaches my longing ears

with the softness

of a summer nights breeze

melodious, harmonious tuneful

a dulcet of those things I hold dear

those things I strive for

but can never bring near;

 

Those are the words

that fuel my pursuit

of a person, a place, or a thing

that can only add up to

 you

 

but, once again, alone as before

I stand in sands that below me

glow lamplit blue in the night

alone, beside the sea of my life

 

here again, I witness the end

of a futile yet hopeful flight

“Who are you?” whispered from you to me

Where are you?” from I to you

and again you flee from me...

​

Stephen W. Winslow