i  detour on the way home
to the light house on the headland
such a grandiose appellation
for a stolid white box  with
a light in it...
more utalitarian than romantic
but still it is nice to see it blink on

but i digress ... i am so ****** tired
beyond the bone, right down to the marrow
god this winter has been so long
and the grief i drag around,
in tattered threads... and sepia tones
leaves me cold....

my heart not in the teaching...
i feel disjointed, displaced .
i have misplaced the knack
to find the joy in youthful creativity
and am running this marathon by rote

i worry that the key won't turn in the lock
and i will be caught within
this cage...
an exhibition in the museum
to has-beens  and never-were's

yet paradoxically...
my performance stellar
sometimes so good
that i fool myself...

god send spring soon....
or i fear am come undone

it has rained for a week
cold and bitter here
give strengnth to  the roots
of my tidily packaged fears

and if i don't see spring soon
they will be spread and torn and ripped
and you will see the inside and
understand the grift

and there the light blinks on
sending out the saving beam
safe secure and strong
and in the shadows
you see the woman
scrabbling at the earth
burying deep in sandy loam
the thoughts birthed from
an  overtired mind
the thoughts that she
must not nurture ...
that needs be left behind
buried deep, stomped  hard
into the ground...

and as she stands in the lee of the light
and looks to the sea ..... she sighs heavily
the turns back into the deepening night
less heavy of heart....able to continue
the fight..... one last look...
then homeward bound....
thanking the lighthouse
and leaving  sacred ground.