I Went Back

I went back to the site of my own desecration

and I returned, what little, I had found.

I saw some unadorned crosses, and violence, and temptation;

and some molested rocks, amidst the crowd.

What I didn’t see was warmth and affection;

what I couldn’t buy was peace, one hundred times untold;

I thought of the truth of the meadows and its flowers;

I said a blessing for some griefs foretold.

I felt sorry for my death, and my casual sense of disrepair;

for my angst, and the ruinous grooves on my brow;

I absolved the past of its shards and I gathered,

some milk and some bread for my sow.

I maintained a dignified sense of elation,

that I was just a visitor to this here, my previous cell.

I returned all the shit that had waited to flower;

and I knew then, that all would be well.

*

From "Buddha's Broken Fingernail," by Daniel Viragh.