Tim Riding Poet Free verse

The Pilgrimage

The Pilgrimage
                  
	      Slowly, walking only in my mind,
	      Retracing life’s strange path
	      Down corridors grey, unlit.
	      Each open door is flanked by others,
	      Forever closed,
	      Yet still the keys are in each rusty lock.

	     
	      My hand moves slowly, touching each in turn,
	      As memories come to life.
	      These portals now on chosen roads
	      That cannot be reversed.
	      Decisions made
	      Knowingly, or still not understood.


	      Further back in time my journey leads,
	      And hand prints mark the walls
	      Made in haste, or for support,
	      They show the jagged line I've walked,
	      It twists and turns,
	      A labyrinth filled with happiness and dread.
	     
	  
	      Light slowly fades the further back I go.
	      Walls narrow, cobwebs stretched
	      In front, not breaking as I pass,
	      Yet still I feel their razor threads
	      Against my skin
	      As I reach more dusty tight shut doors.


	      What if? What if I'd picked a different way?
	      Would I still be me?
	      I'll never know, for though I try,
	      The keys won't turn and let me glimpse
	      What might have been
	      Had fate or reason held a shaking hand.


	      Some doors bring distant memories flooding back,
	      Despair and love and hate,
	      So vivid I must close my eyes
	      To shut out feelings long forgotten.
	      I never should have left
	      This world I know to walk into a mire.

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Dick Bird March 9, 2021 at 12:51 AM I found this when I was looking for poems for a collection related to the Camino de Santiago. It reminded me of a Borges story, I think called labyrinth about an infinite library full of collections of random works, sometimes only differing from others by one word. There's a feeling of loss, more than in Frost's 'Road Not Travelled. But it is a very open poem, I think. Not concerned with self pity but feelings we all have, as a good poem should. Thank you.