Poetry Instead

Untitled....

She says she feels "superfluous".
a feeling of worthlessness, of being unnecessary,
needless.

This, spoken when tears and anxieties consume us both
in a quiet room, at night when thoughts become
menacing monsters, unnameable.

In our mutual exhaustion, reaching towards each other
from the opposite ends of generations,
we sit in silence, struggling to voice the next sentence.

We both know the pain of loss, mine as witness to the
ceaseless passage of time, hers as growing knowledge
through tangled threads of consciousness,
that the time for dreams realized has passed.

What then of the choices that belong to her?
What prayers offered to soothe our pain?
What small and simple pleasures to pluck from a tree that
struggles to survive?

She says she wants "to be loved". Who among us
cannot say the same?
To belong: valued, included, and honored for who we are;
this universal longing. Superfluous; never.

I hold her close, I feel the shiver of her shoulders.
"Lord", I whisper to myself, "let me be an instrument of your peace".
And morning eventually comes.