What Are Words

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What are words but inadequate

To tell what it was like

When Zinfandel ruled with chains?

I saw that I must fight my way

Across the wasteland

Lined with broken glass

That cut into my feet, my hands,

My knees where I stumbled.

There were no landmarks, no maps,

No guide to take my hand and lead me through

This gray with no horizon.

What are words?

Alone I fell into the scorn,

Suspended for an unnamed time.

In vain I sought the blackness

At the edge of obvious disdain.

Even this solace was denied.

When once my eyes closed

Behind my mind, I could not open

Them to look. I could not see

The way but felt a pull

Within. I clawed and struggled

And though a stranger to that place,

I knew its bounds, a wall of fear.

I knew because I laid each brick

Slung together with mortar  

Of flesh and tears and over time

Forgot whom I had caged inside.

I fought until my strength was gone

And in the quiet of No Place

I lay, indifferent, I had no words to care.

A grain of sand crumbled to earth,

Then, another, followed by another

Until the wall came down, destroyed

By the darkness of surrender.

A wish of air breathed sweet

Across my face and for the first time

I knew that I am. What are words to tell?

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