You came to me,
wounded in the half-light
of morning.
Colors,
washed out shades of grey.
Tears streaked cheeks,
lines carved through ashes.
You were not naked,
but your clothes were tattered,
wet and blood stained,
clinging to you,
like a promise,
given by the desperate lips
of the dying.
I did my best to hold you,
to console you
in your frailty.
I feared
that it was within my ability
to crush you
and snuff you out,
putting an end to both our miseries.
The world is hard enough
on one’s own,
and caring for another
can often be
a killing blow.
But like Abraham,
God stayed my hand
and I just held you
in the grey morning
and peered out from our little shelter
at the terrible landscape.
Smoking ruin,
black,
and devoid of life,
and I wondered
if I were selfish
to keep holding on to hope
in this place of death.
You stirred in my arms,
head against my chest
and tears subsiding.
You looked
more ravaged than the world,
but somehow
still beautiful,
beneath your pain and sorrow.
I guess,
that hope is not absurd.
Perhaps it is more precious
when it is found to be
a rarer thing
in these trammel days.
HG – 2019
