Pilgrimage

You have become weary of walking in fog,
of the uncertainty of sight,
of landmarks no longer having value,
of a landscape so changed you no longer recognize it.

You bear the scars of your blindness.
Old and new, they show your weakness,
the humanity of your skin and soul.
Raw and plain, invisible until you bear them,

they nonetheless mar the perfection you never claimed.
There is beauty there, you are told, and love, noble things
bright as the absent sun. worth the journey,
worth the blindness that lingers and lies in the pervasive grey.

There is, they say, color. And light. Both somewhere. Ahead. Perhaps.
Uncertain whether to believe, you walk on,
your blindness and blood easier to survive than surrender,
less painful than despair.

About this poem

This is how I start many of my days. But that is OK. The sun always wins. Even if it’s hard to imagine in the midst of it. It’s one of the places I let my head rule, not my heart. One step at a time. Repeat.

The picture was taken in the quarry across the road.

Tom