AUTUMN LEAVES

“Why love if losing hurts so much? We love to know that we are not alone.” – C.S. Lewis

Autumn Leaves
(FOUND PRESSED BETWEEN THE PAGES OF AN OLD BOOK)

I wouldn’t write to you first, I decided,
And every day I checked the mailbox for your letter,
Having my answer to you already written.

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Looking at the full moon tonight, I remember,
Nights that I spent outside your door awake all night –
Why are bitter remembrances the most persistent?

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They told me someone had asked for me on the telephone today.
My heart skipped beats – could it have been you?
I clean forgot I had refused to give you my new number.

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Come back to me, return, my fount has dried up.
Come and let the fountain flow clear water once more,
Come back and I shall not mind even if its water runs salty.

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I saw you changed last night, repentant, sorry,
As if you’d suddenly realised what you had lost by leaving.
But all I felt right then was peace, a calm after the storm.

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I thought that I had forgotten you, that you were indifferent to me,
But yesterday our common friends remembered you to me,
And I felt hatred – from hate to love a small step.

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As you betrayed me, saying goodbye, you told me
“Wait, for good things come to those who wait…”
And as I wait I lose more and more each day.

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I found a note of yours yellowing, forgotten in a dusty drawer.
I was dismayed seeing on paper old heartbeats jotted down.
And even worse because I thought all of your letters were long since burnt.

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You friend, who see her often, tell me:
Does she still listen to that song?
The song that we listened to together and I could hardly restrain my tears?

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I left, my head held high, my tears swallowed,
My only gain, my pride intact.
I hope that in the long years of loneliness ahead, pride is good company.

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The hours of night, grow smaller, the sky rotates,
Each minute draws out longer than the one before.
Sleep eludes the one who loves too much.

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My heart is healed, I do not let my tears flow in the evenings.
I can bear to look at the full moon unflinchingly,
There is no risk of losing the keys that open my soul’s door.

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And the old captain stares at the horizon,
Scanning the milky depths to find the magic island
Once glimpsed and nevermore to see again…