n that deep dreamless sleep of any ebony
evening, when the edges of tomorrow appear
silhouetted against all of your yesterdays, Hope holds
out her hand and you rise again through starlit space,
to know your purpose is yet unfulfilled. No one will
know, and even you will barely just remember the
open doorway's lure and the calling of your name.
Yet you come in answer, every April evening turned
to August then December; each pilgrimage a trial,
each effort worth its gain.


Why do you travel past yourself, out beyond your
curved reaches of reason - forming your path forward
to what cannot be retrieved in the lucent light of dawn?
Vaporous as the sunrise mist above the treetops leafing,
we can but deliver you back safely to your day's
awakening glow, with a heart full of memories that
only you will know.


You ask us once, "Oh where shall I go with my old
Mother Hope?" and we continue to answer you.


Odd echoes of eternity, stray fragments of forever,
carefully collected certainties -reminders of the
truth, like remnants of infinity, relics of your future,
this treasure of the Ancients, more precious than
your soul. You are Keeper, you are Speaker, you
are nameless - you are real. Like Icarus you fly
to close to the sun and your spirit is seared.
Yet your pain pushes you 'round the sacred mountain
at the top of the world, across the hallowed homeland
at the center of the earth; for there is no other route
through life's lost-linked-labyrinths, and we cannot
recall you nor undo your fated toil.


You also asked us once, "Will this long night last for
the balance of forever?" and we continue to answer
you that, as well.


Hold fast to the silver thread, spun by your becoming,
as you swing through lazuline layers of time like
the spider, flying invisibly tethered - to it's Self.
Hold fast to the Whisper's tale, for there is no letting go.