#WinterABC24: Echoes of Shattered Wishes

They say two minds are better than one, I couldn’t agree more as Takudzwanashe and I took a pen. a blank page and our diverse thoughts to jointly weave together a story of a couple’s broken past peppered with shattered wishes, a hopeful present and perhaps a redemptive future in matters love and healing. Two voices, speaking for two as one. Thus we bestow upon you this poem:

He:
My purpose was defiance: to prove wrong the skeptics
who whispered doubts like curses, to outpace time that
was busy mocking my desperation with its ticks and tocks
and… to down the weight of war-torn memories etched
into my skin. “Impossible! ” my mind screamed to all that.
Till I saw her. There I was with the coat, the shroud I’ve
worn since memory’s dawn: a patchwork of fear, stitched
with trauma, its collar a noose of anxiety. I was ready to
have her, ready to love her my heart cajoled. “I needed
her” my body murmured, even with her eyes glazed over
ghosts of a distant battle. Could I exhume joy, laughter,
and peace from within her depths? Or would I help
decay them beyond recognition, burying them beneath
layers of heartache?

She:
“Breathe….breathe…. 1..2…3, you are doing just fine.”
Am I doing fine or have conditioned my mind to believe
that?When I see danger I open my arms and run to it.
I give it a warm embrace and promise that I won’t leave.
All I wanted was to prove everyone wrong, but I have lost.
I have been digging and wandering in the forest. Will I
find parts of myself that I abandoned, choked to death
and let go in the name of LOVE?Is it too late to dig the
grave and beg joy, laughter and peace to come back to
me? Will my tears have the power to bring them to life?

He:
I can see her mull and mill around her thoughts that
are dear to her like her affinity to broken things. I too,
bear my own silent tempest, a tempest of shattered hopes
and whispered prayers; my heart, once whole, is now
fractured. It’s edges sharp as shards of forgotten promises
beg to hold and soothe away her doubts as I trace the
contours of her pain with my stained fingers seeking
solace, promising to silence her doubts. “Can I do this?
For her, for us…heal and help her heal? Am really
her salvation or merely her favorite poison? Will she
let me in?
 
Her:
I feel as if I am the only one with scars, blood and the pain.
Maybe I have stretched myself, but this is as far as I can go.
I have stacked and built castles for us but can he make a tiptoe for me?
This aching heart needs soothing, this soul needs peace.
If I stay will it not kill me?  If I do go where do I begin?
The pain, tears and the joy has become a part of me for four years.
Tell me, if you were me what would you do?