Wednesday, January 13, 2016

A Guilt You Would Not Understand

A Guilt You Would Not Understand

A knock on the door
that echoed in
the unreachable distance.
The last indelible image
of my love as you faded
in the darkness
of a back bedroom.

The foreboding
that swarmed me
ignored, in favor of
an agenda long forgotten.
The immediacy of the day
superseding the years
of sacrifice in my favor.

The hours spent
playing catch in the absence
of a grandfather or father
not otherwise engaged.
You were love and acceptance
in my eyes and when you passed
I was passive and afraid.

Betrayed by a single weak vessel
in that brain that I so admired,
you lay helpless, a state
that was an anathema
to everything I knew you to be.

Forgive me
for not kicking
that goddamn door down
and carrying you to the help
that might have saved you
and all that you were to me.


SMG