Blue

Wed, 07/29/2015 - 21:16 -- sma1998

Even now, as you sit at my slippered feet

Your youthful eyes so full of hope, so

Unhardened by the terrors of the world,

Yours remind me of mine, once, before the cold

Sent cracks of red like a shattered mirror,

Lightning bolts, even, across my sight.

I remember you asking me once,

“What color are your eyes, Grandpa?”

And me chuckling, ruffling the blond hair

Your mother had given you.

 

I told you blue, because blue is the color

Of the sky, of hope, of dreams untouched

By clouds and thunder and sadness.

But my eyes have held every color-

They are a jail cell whose key will

Forever be lost in time.

They hold the unwavering gaze of my mother,

Singing to me a forgotten lullaby as my father

Bangs in a drunken rage on the door, the

Fabric of her red dress pressed close to my cheek.

They have captured my first kiss with the

Raven-haired girl who then flew away herself

Into a world I dared not follow.

They have enclosed the soldier, begging,

Reaching out to me, my best friend!

Yet I, struck with terror, ran until the brown earth

At my feet was alive with a blur of

Emotions running rampant at night.

But perhaps the worst thing they have

Held was the day when I woke up in a panic,

My shaking hands clutching the white sheets,

Sighing in relief that it was over-

Except it had only just begun.

 

Yet, as I look at you, with your unseeing

Ones, a murky blue, and think of the day

You were born- when the cracks in my

Eyes seem to have faded a little bit, my

Wrinkles smoothed away by an unknown

Force, and when I held you in my arms I

Felt a rush of happiness, shed a solitary

Tear which splashed on the ground,

And, just for a moment, my eyes flickered

 

With the faintest tinge of blue.

This poem is about: 
My country

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