Finally Morning
We said our morning prayers
gratitude seeping from over the bowls
of darkness no milk spilled
so early in the day while stars still
winked down on us from within
their endless emptiness
it had been night for so long
dreams interspersed with the usual
terror until suddenly it was over
and there we were in an empty house
on an empty street no sounds
of traffic in this tiny empty town
lost in the depths of a forest
a place perhaps impossible to describe
not in any country we had ever known
no birds in the trees no clouds
in the skies nothing but the ghosts
of all the mornings we had missed
sleeping and waking through a night
that lasted for years if we only knew
what we were looking for
we would lock into that direction
and walk and walk until
we reached it our breathing heavier
as we scaled mountains descending
lightly into another empty town.
_____________
Paul Ilechko