28 Poems - 4

Innocence

Innocence is a fresh-faced girl in white.
Her eyes cut through defenses like a sword,
disarming men with guns, turning petty
tyrants from their pretensions to an inkling
of the profound. The smile of Innocence
pierces the coldest heart with melting flame
and like true north, to which all magnets turn,
her joy gives stillness and direction to
the lost. Her clear voice echoes in your bones,
and even when she whispers, the loud world
will catch its breath and then inhale again,
making her words their air, like thirsty roses
drinking up misty rain. And when she acts,
her every deed and motion shouts belief,
for what's belief but trusting what you know
and saying what you feel? And when you do,
when you believe, the world gives in to you.

Once we knew this without knowing we knew,
and acted without acting. Now we search
in our forgotten way for Innocence,
a happy, fresh-faced girl dressed all in white.
But she has vanished. It is her sad fate,
despite her honest inner strength, to fall
deeply and hopelessly in love with Guilt,
and willingly be locked up in his house
where she will slowly lose herself in him
and bear him many healthy sons and daughters,
who will not fail to take after their father.


copyright 20099 Matthew J Wells