Francois Bergh
where lost words come to rest in pieces…Archive for Sorrow
Scatterings
Fate resides in memories
Like scatterings of shattered dreams
In washed-up bits on broken shores
Where strangers gather to explore
Romatic sunsets hand-in-hand
As lovers roaming on the sand
To pick up pieces of my soul
Among the wishes of the wayward
Left to dry on far-off beaches
And forgotten by the angels -
Whispers strewn in starry skies
Of sorrow hidden by the night
And swallowed by the ebbing tide…
Sold out
Oh, sorrow divine;
You took my last rhyme -
This pain is now mine
To ride for all time…
No bigger a shove
Than misguided love -
To fall from above
As a lightning-struck dove…
The lesson was learned
That once a heart spurned
It will remain burned
And can’t be returned…
So look here no more;
There’s nothing in store -
Just more empty floor
Behind this old door…
The end
Like the last sands seeping through the hourglass
I’m bleeding my lethal sorrow through burst veins…
Misery’s mammoth trunk constricts my broken heart
and I gasp while the thick air escapes my lungs…
My soul is teeming from a thousand butterflies
the flutterling-children dancing on my skin -
I waver and wrestle against the growing despair
but the cords of grief have conquered my will…
My eyes reach out to the star-barren heavens;
the endless murk is reflecting-repeating:
my tragic plea, splintered and shattered-
the fruits of delight now rotten and spoilt…
Crumpled and cold I collapse and crumble
My being becomes liquid – a whirling vortex;
I am swept along by the flooded rivers;
the tumble-twirl tempo shredding my thoughts…
And then there is nothing – I float fatigued -
Around me the vacuum of tranquil harmony…
I drink the silence – the sweet relief
And soar through the portals of salvation…
-Translated from the Afrikaans poem “Die einde” by Francois Bergh
