Holding the Past

Let us walk through time together,

Dare to take my hand —

Calloused, hard, a worker’s hands,

Strong enough to bend steel,

Yet gentle to tend a wounded animal.

She was daring enough once.

She grasped my hands with flourish,

With wild abandon to all and none.

So like a tsunami was she —

We were all caught in her wake.

Yet as the years passed,

Her grip lessened by degrees,

While mine grew firmer by measure.

Till one day, after seventeen years,

I realized I was holding the past.

Still my heart belongs to her:

Her sometimes lopsided smile,

The dimpled cheek on the right side,

The blazing red hair half-dyed,

A singer and a songstress both.

Long have we walked side by side,

Even if not hand in hand now.

We were once, and to me we remain so —

Pilgrims sharing the journey on the road,

Toward the One we call Him.

Foolish bird that I am,

I keep singing for her still —

Even when she turns away,

Unheeding of the song in caged glory,

Or the story posted on the page.

As always, this is Dust:

To you,

For you,

From Him,

In me.