"For Meg, Leaving Home"

Lights on everywhere, except where I am sitting

Writing this first letter since you left,

Knowing that what I write, I will not send –

That one comes later, full of cheerful news;

This is the one I have to write to me.

Once you were all promise, flower in the bud,

Sitting like Buddha on your yellow rug,

Catching the sun’s motes with your fingers,

Your thoughts mysterious, wordless; and I felt

Nothing could come between you and the light.

But now I know first child has more to break

Than barriers of blood and bone; the soul’s old pain,

The dark confusions of the blood, remain;

And all that karmic legacy broods still

Over the sunrise of your going forth.

Today I cleared your room of those old treasures

You could not bear to put away yourself:

Flotsam of empty bottles, unburned candles,

Paper flowers faded from the sun,

Buckles, yellow stockings, birthday cards;

And when I had finished the room stood stripped of your presence

Except for one orange flower and a Van Gogh print;

I felt like a nurse with an antiseptic bottle

Tidying up after death, removing all traces,

Putting what’s left behind in boxes;

And my throat was thick with the things I could never say,

Or even if I had, you could not have listened to;

And you are sent out on that same exhausting journey

Through wrong choices, false love.  Yet for love’s sake

I hurl you into the universe, and pray.

- Netta Gillespie

Came across this poem this morning and thought it was beautiful.