A Vain Farewell Of Fleeting Hope

Here I sit in this tomb of failed thoughts,

words crafted by hearts that eyes will never see.

 

All around me the other envelope’s voices echo

in pure lament of never being delivered,

every hope and dream dying

among this mound of abandoned correspondence

left to rot and fade in oblivion,

oh how cruel fate is to these sacred sayings

dipped in such passion and sent by faith

to a destination they never reached.

 

My pages remember being held

by that hand so shaking and trembling,

a father dying of cancer

bedridden in a hospice

and penning this letter to his son

overseas in Iraq.

 

Pouring out his feelings,

expressing his pain over the death of his wife,

mentioning his agony

about all the things he never said

when his son was at home.

 

Tears staining the pages

while his failing strength scribbled his lines,

ending with including a key to a safe deposit box,

one he hadn’t told anyone about,

containing precious gems and rare stamps,

a life time of collections he had kept a secret,

having wanted to wait until his son came home

in order to give it to him as surprise.

 

But the dreaded disease had slain his plans,

now trying before his last breath to send his gift

unto his only son,

ending with saying how proud he was of him,

which he had never told him growing up.

ending with his farewell of love.

 

Sealing it before calling the nurse

so she could write the delivery location

since his hands were too exhausted to write that part.

 

In his pain killer delirium he missed part of the numbers,

and the nurse used a label for the return address,

which fell off when it was being handled,

leaving me in this postal morgue.

 

I can feel the father’s ghost mourning,

it burns with such intensity

over how his son will never know its sentences

or learn of the treasure,

which he’ll never get as an inheritance.