Forever Ours to Keep

They're crowding in my throat again,
The many unspoken words,
Jostling and grasping for life,
The remnants of the truth,
Amidst my happiness they open up,
Like many petals in the sun,
Different voices from the past,
Absorbed through the perfect detail of consciousness,
Stored away under lock and key,
Now ready to walk free in this world once more,
So I breath them into this space,
And form vibrations from the emotions they contain,
I give words to the wordless, the invisible feelings within,
And as I speak, my shoulders drop,
I admit to peace in this strange place,
I complete sentences long cut short,
I walk in rooms where I never have been,
Yet I know them through my ancestors' hearts,
Held there in my panoramic gaze,
I see a journey of struggles and pain,
Yet also is there a silent love, a faith and a purposeful aim.

To all those who have lifted us up,
With their invisible grace and their well intentioned mistakes,
I now acknowledge and thank and celebrate,
To all those who died selfless and confused,
Know that this day you have been deified,
For love is eternal yet buried deep,
Love is eternal and forever ours to keep.

(As you get older and stronger and wiser then you can start to get to know your past again. Things that hurt you first time round can be re-visited from a different perspective. What once overwhelmed you emotionally no longer has that same power. This poem is about such a re-visiting of the the past, a re-living, a re-processing of what has been ('I complete sentences long cut short'). And sometimes you re-visit the past and realise that is not 'your stuff' that you are feeling but actually the 'stuff' that was passed down to you in the collective psyche of your family, your country, your race ('I walk in rooms where I never have been'). The poem mirrors many that I have written in that it starts from a personal perspective but naturally evolves into a collective awareness. As this poems reaches for its ending, the collective awareness fills the space completely and assumes a celebration. For beneath the buried hurt of personal emotions and beneath the buried hurt of collective emotions is discovered a different 'strata'; the love of the collective consciousness. 'Love is eternal yet buried deep, Love is eternal and forever ours to keep'. This then the surprising reward from a bout of rueful yet determined introspection!)