Bottled Prayers - a poem

Bottled Prayers

why do i feel this way,
bottled and corked with an expiry date ahead,
thoughts of you peering through smoked glass
forlorn and trapped within things unsaid.

soon to be pruned and withered,
gasping for oxygen, heaving to be heard,
nothing escapes, not a mote of smouldering ash
that in another lifetime were thoughts of you.

so how shall i proceed, how shall i continue?

staunch these errant proceedings of my mind,
nick these curdling swirls in the nick of time,
siphon them helpless, muzzled and holed,
a million bottles in the basement of my soul.

for you are no longer,
and though thought persists,
my thoughts should not be of you,
forever you.

and in the twilight, still, oh so still,
even the tremblings cease,
a million thoughts brought to their knees
praying a hundred prayers for peace,
and a hundred for release...

*25nov03*