Metamorphosis

I have been blinded to the future

Yoked, as I am, to the past.

The boxes of mementos mori

Weigh me down with the taste of dust

The stale scent of incompletion.

The smiles I wore in those years

Were left breathless and blue

Stillborn epitaphs inked upon

The backs of photographs

And keepsakes no longer meaningful

To the guttering ghost I have become,

Haunting my own shuttered life

Hunting for refuge in dark corners

From anamnesis.

Today, November’s candles

Smoke in the waning sun

But I shall feed tomorrow’s Midwinter bonfire

With yesterday’s pain and paper

Today's fallen leaves

Glowing butterflies against the cold and darkness

To light my way onward.