Loss and Remembrance

I understand the poignancy and pain

Of kings who suffered irreparable loss,

Who owning all no longer did retain

Aught but sorrow and her maid, remorse,

Who built their mausoleums and their tombs

Remembrances of grief they could not bear

And lay in gardens redolent with blooms

The bones of the beloved and the fair.

And if they had their life to live again

To see the cherished smile, the warm embrace,

Would they requite all wealth for the sole gain

Of eyes beheld on Beauty's worshipped face,

Meet all the unfair challenges of fate

With equal heart, accept the peasant's toil,

The labourer whom all manipulate,

The ploughman bent above unyielding soil?

I feel a sadness stretching through the years,

Millenniums of energy and zeal

Dissolved and in their stead unwelcome tears,

A place unknown, an emptiness unreal

Devoid of joy, the skies of God now dull

When suddenly the light of lights is gone,

All vacant grown that once was vast and full,

In cloud-grey misery to drift alone

And sheds night's tears that stain the skies of morn.

Can one soul contemplate another's grief

Is there a greater sadness to be borne

Than unreal death who shatters our belief,

Does pain translate to other hearts and minds,

Can we in the slow vibrations of the stone

A secret find among the abstruse signs

That life survives though seemingly has flown

Into the dark companionship of night.

Shall I weary of these anguished days

Find solace for the soul and seeking light

Approach the calm so foreign to our ways.

Would she who treasured our resolve in life

Wish any less when spirit's raiment fell

Than I continue mid this worldly strife

To seek for heaven in our human hell.