Arc of Coloured Light on Dark

[Cheshire Cat]

The Lady in the Camellia

Unheard

I can still see your unspoken words,

Unheard yet reverberating in

A resonance of sweet harmonious dissonance,

Overtones my eyes recognise as colours

But which my ears fail to comprehend.

And in their watery reflections,

Your eyes also have their music

Transparent and wordless like unvoiced vowels

Silent like the camellia I hold in my hand.

And if I tilt this flower

And you come tumbling out,

Wings ruffled and delicious in your impotent rage

Would you not utter a single admonishing phrase

I gaze upon the flower, this miniature garden

Glorying in nature's flawless imperfections,

And see only the product of a sterile yard,

No faerie, no feminine presence

Nothing more than a garden weed.

Perhaps all this is not music, not poetry,

No garden of words and other intelligible sounds,

No lost language a tiny human being might speak,

Only the end note of the last lark,

Rising on its final evening ascent,

The note not even he can hear nor even knows he's uttered,

The note that neither bids goodbye nor greets in open arms,

But simply says, "You are Alone,"

The cold autumnal night has descended

I am lost. I must find my own way home.

© Chesya 2007