A/N: Written for the Diversity Writing Challenge at the AMF, a9 – write a poem 100-150 words. This one's 139.
Torches out of Leaves
He'd had such a shallow life before, skating on the surface
but never looking underneath, never looking beyond
the reflection of that glowing sun, so spread and worn –
He'd never thought the sun would one day drown,
but it did. It drowned and there was no moon
to replace it. He had to make his own light instead
without the tools, without two sticks to rub together
But there was a door that led to a forest
and he was a leaf floating through, grappling
for branches, for something stronger
than the sun's mirror-face
And he finds it, after wandering in the dark waters,
deaf and blind, water feeling his eyes and ears
and mind. He finds it, in the depths he's never looked before:
This soft pulsating thing
not dependant on another's whims
and that doesn't go out.