A Poem a Day 2015 (29): Forgive me #2minutesgo

Another one written for writer JD Mader's 2-minute Friday challenge on his website, Unemployed Imagination - http://www.jdmader.com/2015/02/2-minutes-go.html. This one took longer than 2mins, probably 10. Cheers.

Forgive me

If I count the hours

Will the light come quicker

Squeezing the endless dark

Until it has no breathing space?

I need more than a flicker

To gently remind myself 

The knowing is meaningful

Is this a jail sentence

This whispering in my ear?

Criticism upon witticism

So insincere and damning

Or solely the creation of my fear

I need this light, only a little

I need this morning to arrive

If I ignore the hours

Will the dawn come not at all

Offering me a final escape

From myself, the only one to blame

For my rise and my foolhardy fall

I pause, awaiting the hour to bring forth

The hangman dressed in black 

If you forgive me all these things

Will it render me sane?

Or will the tide drift further

Tugging me to its farthest reach

Away, where agony is my true bane

These minutes grate on my soul

Tearing the skin from my bones

copyright Vickie Johnstone