Poem: The Chains of Inspiration

The Chains of Inspiration
listen to this poem here

There are no lights in the barn.
Only the sun, filtered from broken windows
and doors that hang open on a single hinge, only these
prevent the old structure from complete darkness.

You walk inside, where you spent so much time
when you were young, your retreat from a world
you felt so shackled to that there seemed no escape
strong enough, powerful enough

to break the invisible iron that held you,
as surely as the manacles that once bound
ancient crusaders to dungeon walls, until
either rescuers or death claimed them.

Your eyes peer deep into the darkness,
and you see chains, unexplainably broken,
like your own, broken not by design,
but by some cosmic plan that forced you

back into the light,
back into love, no matter how afraid
you believed you were, into the joyous fear
of your new found freedom,

and you dance in the bright noon light,
sing like a madman, your arms raised heavenward
like a priest who no longer hears the chains of bondage,
but instead, hears only the wind of God.

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The picture was taken in Surry County, Virginia. You can click on it for a larger version.

Tom