Getting To Know You
You were taboo
The one we didn't talk about
A faint memory shaping my life.
You were a presence
Real once now gone
But you lingered in our minds.
You were the curiosity
The one I couldn't ask about
Starting tears and days of sadness
You were the obsession
the one kept secret
But I took note every time you were mentioned
I hold close every vague detail
wanting to learn
The storyteller is gone and I'm searching.
I rummage through her things
looking for you, and there are few answers;
So few pictures and a small box of writings
Some may deem it easy;
Asking your siblings or mine.
Breaking through the wall of silence
takes more breath than I have.
And so I sit with a box of letters and poems
Trying to put together the essence of you.
Heartbreaking notes--
their love and contents painful and rare
too brief sentiments--
sent from reaches of the world.
Strophes, carefully crafted and guarded
Lest parts be deleted in transit.
I look at my own scribbling
And I see part of you,
A precious part, that no one else shares.
I guard it jealously hording it away from the light.
This is the one part they cannot have.
This is the only part I have and they don't.
They have memories,
I wonder if they can be persuaded;
I wonder if they'll share.
I'm just getting to know you,
but, perhaps, I had
one of the best parts all along.
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