WINTER STORMS
BY CHRIS LEWIS
Frozen in timeless moments,
I watch them grow
Through pictures on a wall.
Unable to see ailments
Nor sadness they cover
With smiling poses and glee.
Children most of all,
I know your unknown pain:
Wondering, waiting, listening.
Unable to define a void.
That distant chasm present,
Cold winds echo from below.
Your resilience amazes:
Strong, capable, adaptive.
The pictures never move.
Yet they do change.
Year after year, life,
Expressed through still frames.
Your laughs beautiful and free,
Though apex resonance deficient.
Mere electronic measures.
Ghostlike, the faces
Stare back in stasis;
A moment forgotten.
Yet the only moments
Other than the memories I hold;
Truth found in pixels.
The old, I watch
You wither and shrink.
Peace or worry?
Masters of this life,
You hold back misery
So young may grow.
Such as knobbed branches
Of a full grown tree
Protecting new sprigs beneath.
Resilience knows no end.
From babe to bier
Strength will carry.
If only I may take
Your stress and pain,
Cast them far away.
To be there to bear
Your burdens and discord,
With shoulder and hand.
So that next picture
When taken will define
True happiness and peace.
Fill that chasm obsolete,
Erase the yearning of divide;
In this moment find complete.
Photographs on my wall
Stare back quiet stasis.
Icy winds, snow begins to fall. | CP
ORIGINALLY FROM SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA, CHRIS LEWIS IS OF IRISH AND UKRAINIAN DECENT. HE LOVES AND APPRECIATES THE ART, BEAUTY, AND UTILITY OF WRITING. CHRIS IS AN ENTHUSIASTIC MEMBER OF THE GROUND BENEATH US WRITING GROUP, THOUGH HE IS NO LONGER AT OREGON STATE PENITENTIARY.
