A stranger to the moods of the land where I first saw the light of day,
An alien to every place where my foot has left an ephemeral imprint since,
I’ve learnt a long time ago that I do not belong…
An outsider.
Once I believed this lack – an affliction. I searched for the certainty of a home,
The security of an identity that is fixed, immutable.
Not so today.
I’ve made of this prison an ocean; for its shell I have fashioned a sail.
Hear the tempest howl. Listen to the silence shatter.
Shards cutting deep, until words pour crimson from my fingertips.
A soul adrift. A writer.
A world in flux. Its secrets – ours to unveil. Its pain – ours to render intelligible.
It is a beautiful place when a crisp line makes it so,
A torrent of despair when ink carves through its darkest corners,
Bruising out truths we would rather forget.
Yet every line is enveloped in precarious indeterminacy –
It is here to be read for a moment only – a glimpse of light
Before the night sets in.
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vic briggs 