Job

Job did complain
a little -
Perhaps it was
in the dimming
shade of evenings
gone on too
long in pain,
anguish for losses
uncountable.
The ache of
despair and
darkest fears,
unleashed again
once more until
he wondered
if perhaps he
had gone mad
and lay
coughing, hacking
out his life's blood
and hoping that
morning would
bring him home
to God.
I wonder if
perhaps when
wrath had been
beaten out
and joy had
come, did Job,
walk crookedly,
slowly up the
mountainside and
weep for all that
was lost.

© Eleanor Clark
20 August, 2015

Photographic Memory

we took no photo
to commemorate the moment
when we stood, the city
at our feet -
or when the sun rose
after a night of
walking.

instead, like
copperplate engravings
we etched the moment
mystically into
the folds and sinews
of the synapses,
firing away in
perfect synchronization.

paper may decay -
and perhaps our
brains one day
as well, but somehow,
that moment seems
more than preserved
in the echoing
silences between
the spaces that hold
us together, and tell
us who we are.

© Eleanor Clark
5 July 2015

across the continents

there is a me that
runs through childhood
fields of memory
spanning continents
wrapped up in
waving swirls of
drying grass, baking
in the summer sun.

there is a me that
walks along the
rain-drenched streets
of a city old with
time and oddly cornered
curbs and benches
dotted with graffiti in
a language unexpectedly
become my own.

there is a me that
sits on the dock to
hear the gently lapping
slaps of waves against
the hulls of boats lined
up like a flock of
cranes roosting for the
night on concrete poles -
branches reaching
to the winter sky.

there is a me that
wanders under the
white embrace of
cherry-blossom petals
falling pale, pink,
spring snow onto the
hair and shoulders of
young couples strolling,
whispering secrets while
the old look on -
their dreams hidden
like mine.

© eleanor clark
16 June, 2015

Plastic Hope

Tonight I remembered
the life-like newborn
doll I played with
years ago, now
wrapped up in
swaddling tissue
paper in a cardboard
box lined with memory.
She wore clothes
that matched the
outfit my baby
brother wore - a
hand me down so
I could copy Mom,
folding nappies and
cradling this plastic
infant. Tonight I
wept at childish
dreams that ache
and burn in the
corners of the soul.
The children of the
barren wife might
be more numerous
for their future-promised
sons and daughters
still to bear, but --
for tonight the dreams
and hopes are as
lifeless as that doll.

© Eleanor Clark
21 May, 2015