Dark Pond

DARK POND

 

It was a night of unheard-of quiet

in some remote park

where shadows of dark, leafy trees

rested on a calm pond.

 

The faint fragrance of summer’s end

still hung in the air.

No branch ever stirred. The world

had ceased to exist.

 

What somber question hovered there

below the

sable weight of night, shrouding my

being, my life, me?

 

In that vast silence it felt so right

to die alone . . .

But how on earth could I have faced

my final hour?

 

Had there been a bird call,

instead of that silent omen,

I could’ve lain down in peace and

somehow braved

 

the dark calm of fading dreams . . .

But no, I ducked in fear when,

rushing out of nowhere, that sudden

strange, dark shape flitted past;

 

and ever since I fled the pond’s brink,

a mute, unspeakable something

has remained . . .

untold . . .

 

 

Photo of a Dark Pond

I experienced the event described in “Dark Pond” probably in 1970 or 1971 in Germany. To this day I don’t know exactly what happened and how. But I do remember that I was having occasional suicidal thoughts at the time. What probably saved me that night was the omen.

DARK POND

 

It was a night of unheard-of quiet

in some remote park

where shadows of dark, leafy trees

rested on a calm pond.

 

The faint fragrance of summer’s end

still hung in the air.

No branch ever stirred. The world

had ceased to exist.

 

What somber question hovered there

below the

sable weight of night, shrouding my

being, my life, me?

 

In that vast silence it felt so right

to die alone . . .

But how on earth could I have faced

my final hour?

 

Had there been a bird call,

instead of that silent omen,

I could’ve lain down in peace and

somehow braved

 

the dark calm of fading dreams . . .

But no, I ducked in fear when,

rushing out of nowhere, that sudden

strange, dark shape flitted past;

 

and ever since I fled the pond’s brink,

a mute, unspeakable something

has remained . . .

untold . . .

 

 

Photo by A.I Shadin on Unsplash