And if within your home I’d held your hands
as you had rest your chin against the wall
perhaps within my heart I’d understand you now
and wake to find illuminating light
But your promises could never wake me from the deep
or open up your eyes from life’s eternal sleep
A long day’s end of blackened rain does call out for sleep
I saw your face so framed by wood, held onto your cold hands
My heart’s lone discontent lies somewhere in the deep;
stuck beneath couch cushions, imprisoned by your walls
That you would keep from me the one true source of light
…Expect me here and now
to cry and to call out your name: if now
could be enough to wake you from that sleep
that long before this “death” had come had robbed you of your light
had dragged the love and miracles from cracked and calloused hand
and splattered what love we had left ‘gainst Mother’s painted walls
then waltzed your pride a distance only God could reach: too deep
And this is who and where you are now: the deep
Your eyes are closed, and you must know
time has left you loveless, and your walls
have left us bruised, and bitter – without sleep
So mother wakes and stands all day: a hammer in her hands,
chipping away at obstinate brick, begging for rays of light
to flood back in, to fill our lives. Oh light,
was it he that pushed you beyond the boundaries, into the deep?
Oh, we missed your presence, foremost, then your hands
and feet. Singing hymns of reunion, and praying you were homeward now
Yet all the while you did sleep
your limbs curled up, on the other side, all love and wisdom muffled by
that Wall;
all our cries one blur of stifled noise. Oh wall,
come down. Please let back in our light
With you we might lie peacefully again to sleep
Might let you back in deep
But here we stand and here you lie, now
Given o’er to aching earth and father’s timely hands.
All that’s left is my own hands to break down your old walls.
And now to let back in some light,
allow the dirt to cave in o’er the deep, ‘llow you to get some sleep.
