Out Into the Night

Photo: (c) Jamie K. Reaser

I wish we could have sat in council

and I could have held space

for your story.

It doesn’t seem right that

women still have to walk

out into the night alone to

unburden themselves

of anguish.

What these constellations know

of the suffering heart must

be something terrible,

and true.

I wonder if you are aware

of your own bravery.

Warriors of this kind aren’t

given commendations.

Did the Parvin ever speak to

you of your beauty?

I pray for you a place among

these distant sisters:

How well they understand

the mercilessness of

a love that relentlessly

pursues the soul.

The grief I’ve shed in this darkness

is for a world yet too small

to accommodate so

large a heart.

But,

night’s more than half gone

now my dear and it’s time

we return to the tents.

At sunrise only the

other women who have

trekked across the sands

will know

of our courage.

and,

for now,

that has to be enough.

~ Jamie K. Reaser, Author

From "Truth and Beauty: Poems on the Nature of Our Humanity"

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