18. Sometimes

Sometimes

A sad woman asked me

“Can this be changed?”

and hoped I would have

a key in my pocket

to fit the lock of her

despair.

The lonely man asked

“What shall I do?”

as we both sat,

with his chain ankle ghost,

that manacled

freedom.

Sometimes,

we keep our souls

in a locked box

on the window sill

and fear death’s fingers

if it rattles.

Sometimes,

we seek to hear only

clattering dialogue of thought,

clanking down the

one way tracks to

contention.

And sometimes

the truth is hidden in cell-seeds

trapped in shoulder stories,

or the anxious rope tale

of your skipping

stomach.

“What does your body say?”

I want to ask.

The answers

will hold their

breath and wait

for you.

But only in that

rejected, split off

holder, in the

soft sacred

fruiting

body bowl

Will you ever feel

the right question to ask.

The question that

tells you, finally:

it is time

to harvest.

Painting by AWM, Day 18 of his Daily Painting Project http://awmartist.blogspot.co.uk/