Natasha Haidar
Poet
Golden Girl
Dear Heart, Dear Sylvia
Lost deep in the blackest pain
Yearning for absolute silence and darkness
Eternal, but no fit ending at all
For that voice within you
That would not be still.
And so, you would write,
To free that voice.
Bright, beaming, golden girl
With constant smile and glowing laughter
So happy, you would glow and burn.
The world lit up by you
Brighter than the sun
Illuminating the corridor
Behind you, that time.
Best memory in the world - of you,
Golden girl.
Your old dream-idyll,
Of true, idolatrous love,
Six stormy wonderful years,
With your truly-beloved.
Now left alone,
Reeling in your particular wild agony,
At a love,
Both pleasure and pain.
Now drowning, gasping for air
Your heart half-killed,
Your old self,
Your old sweet life,
Unreachable, lost forever.
So you could not stay,
To see the hope you inspired.
You would not live,
To see your beautiful babies blossom.
The snow, the bitter February cold
Of that wretched day,
You, in a pit of panic and deep freeze,
Full of fear, with empty loneliness,
And maddening solitude.
If only our love, all of it
Could have saved you.
His killing passion,
An uncertain future,
The ending,
The finality of it all,
Now clear as water.
Out of his shadow, you rose,
Now yourself once again,
But unable to be yourself,
Impossible to love yourself.
That familiar morbid gloom descended,
A paralysis of the spirit and soul,
From the deepest depths.
Nothing left of you to salvage now.
As the light went from your life,
You put out the most precious light,
That you couldn’t see.
But even in darkness,
It’s not dark to you.
Night, shining bright like day,
Darkness is light to you.
In dreams and apparitions,
You now appear.
Your earthly memories treasured,
As if you never died to me.
Now, you are Ariel
Brittle and ethereal,
All encompassing,
Eternal and free.
The cool breeze blows down upon my brow,
The delicate rustle of leaves,
Revelling in life, I feel you.
Dear Sylvia, Dear Heart.
Natasha Haidar © 2019