forgiveness – Little Bristling Soul

Some Pines

For Linnea Blank

I suppose it doesn’t matter whether or not

it was those cheaply made,

with novice genius, gems called Aurora Borealis,

or if it was the real thing, retelling me, like you,

what it is to be so close to the sky,

aware of every turn of phase and drift,

what it is to be the sky,

spreading in gorgeous gasps

of cloud-cut color: Aurora Borealis.

But it does matter

because the natural pains

of forgiveness to someone

who deserves it or not

and harbouring hurt in yourself

for no result, make the difference,

though this is untrue,

for you wear your forgiveness

like gems across your chest

and this makes the difference.

I’ve been known to endlessly apologize,

mostly because I know I haven’t yet done it right.

I shirk responsibility,

perhaps making it worse or better with time,

though probably worse either way

if you shouldn’t forgive me. I am selfish,

this I know, and turn too far inwards

for it to be knowledge but rather

a kind of hiding from self and world,

though they are both beautiful.

I wouldn’t force your love

with any number

of rewritten geometries

minimizing nature

and you together on page,

but I am,

so that you can hold it in your hand,

something a bit more real,

a prettiness for you

so that you might see yourself reflected,

know what you mean to me:

the tips of those pine trees vibrating

in that color you found for me,

brought to me as a thing of love,

that you loved, a little too much

like the color of your widened eyes for me,

stock still photographed, a memory,

neither blue nor green

but a pinprick of something

that needs remembering.

Indescribable,

one would know though,

or maybe that you bolster

our shared belief in animalian understanding,

chirping to cats on the street

so that they remember pines,

a bird too strange too eat

sitting in branches of promised growth and love.

And your speech,

though I know you hate it,

it pierces me like those pine needles.

My first memory of you in those white shoes

and that ridiculous fur coat;

I was drawn to you out of curiosity

and I think, maybe, respected you more for it,

you, articulate and speckled with glints of beauty.

Damn them, I am more than just a beautiful body

but my body is beautiful and I will not reject it.

This is what I heard in you, comforted

that you were always ready to say something

and that I could just listen without the constant

dull pressure of poetical retort in presumed genius,

alleviated, but then, I did say something genius,

or so you told me. I believe you.

I suppose the conversation

couldn’t help but elicit it,

or inspire something in me

just naturally to come

from the clandestine me

that I am always hiding away.

This must be a part of my apology,

I suppose, one among many

future admonitions though

I don’t want you to think

I’m asking you to forgive me,

just believe me when I say

I do love you.

I suppose I hope that this

helps you to avoid harbouring

any pain I may have caused you,

me amongst burrowed forgetfulness

of the beauty of some pine trees.

—ray osborn