CANTICLE FOR A HEALING BY GRACE

      CANTICLE FOR A HEALING BY GRACE

I loved you half my life ago
I love you still
The change it wrought
my life would not
let go
An act of faith
of will

And, looking back
it taught me what
I wanted
and what I did not
to what I must cling
and what forsake

The lessons learned
were not, at first, apparent
My trial by fire
would still render me spent
Grief beyond measure
Blind and muted sorrow
Faltering steps
now quickened to the pyre
Ophelia's surge to endless depths
of black tomorrows
An implored epiphany
sought, yet unrevealed

And those facile, much oft repeated words
"Time heals all wounds"
A droning so devoid of meaning
My mantra without hope of mercy
A capitulating litany

But there are wounds
that should never heal!
A fruited unrelenting life bursts forth
from their convulsing flesh!

And so, my friend, my steady, loyal
closely-in-my-heart-wrapped friend
Slowly, slowly, so slowly I forget
how delicate its dawning,
a peace and gentleness
did shyly, tentatively show
that my life would fain
bold richness hold
and such unbearable sweetness yield
if I would only let
His manna me sustain
His milk and honey through me flow..........

                                                    By Marta Esperanza Edgcombe
                                                      Begun Friday, April 19, 1996
                                                        Completed Thursday, January 27, 2005

In Remembrance
  of R.L.B.
      December 5, 1935 ~ January 10, 2008