By Jesanae Tekani
Black on black, unseen, unknown,
Growing in a garden lone,
Seeking out a crypt of bone
And silent in its seeming.
A simple rose it saw below,
A beauty it had yet to know,
Reminding of a land of snow
With blood upon it gleaming.
And seized by jealous apathy,
The blackness lingered by the tree
To watch the rose so silently--
It dreamed forlorn and bitter.
The rose, it told of many things;
The symbol of what loving brings,
A flower to be given wings
Or borne upon a litter.
The blackness, held in wonder's thrall,
Implored the rose to tell it all,
But no more answered blackness' call
The rose, in wisdom blooming.
In vain the darkness pled and cried
Only to find the rose had died--
Nor may a rose forever bide,
But fade into the glooming.
And so the darkness goes its way,
Bereft of reason there to stay,
And nowhere to its burdens lay,
Nor ever solace finding.
The black-on-black forever flows,
A soul that only torment knows.
It seeks the wisdom of the rose
To loose it from its binding.
Send opinions to: chekov_leningrad@hotmail.com