SILVER STAR

Walter William Safar

I have long since lost Hope,
because my paths are so endlessly long and aimless,
as if sculpted out of my restless spirit
in the long nights of reverie.

You know, Lord... I used to have my Hope.
It was so nice to stand next to the Christmas tree
with my mother,
and look at its proud top,
where our silver star shone,
my favorite Hope. 

To me, a child who never decorated his own tree,
it was the biggest Christmas tree in the world,
and the brightest star beyond the heavenly dome.
Each night before Christmas we would return to the same place
with the same desire and faith,
until our terrible companions, the long, cold nights
have invoked death
and stolen my mother.

I am motionlessly standing and staring into this dark, cold night,
like an avenger yearning for revenge,
and a thin woman in rags is passing me by,
whispering warm words into a child's frozen ear.

The child is looking up with the same gaze
like I did when my mother used to show me the silver star,
whispering into my frozen ear
that someday I shall touch that silver star too,
silvering all the orphanages of this dark world.

Her warm words are still crossing my mind:
Son, always stand on your toes and look up...
and you shall touch your star!
My eyes have long since stopped sparkling
and they don't look up.
They used to be the big, bright eyes of a child,
that shone in the dark,
like two young embers that were just set afire,
but now... oh, now my eyes are but burnt out embers
in the squeezing fist of the cold world.

You know, Lord, how much I wanted to stand on my toes
and look up,
but life always threw me back to my knees.
I admit that I haven't been standing on my toes for a long time,
but I am not kneeling, either,
I am only looking down
into the dark reflections of people's characters,
and my Hope is once again so far away,
as if it's afraid of my faithful squire,
which is standing at the bottom of the silky net,
not like a fly
but like a master of many a fly big and small,
because Death has that justified purpose
to come for its flies regardless of their size.

I am not looking at death like a fugitive,
but a penitent man,
who wants just another chance.
How strange it is, Lord,
that even a man abandoned by Hope wants his chance.
Yes, Lord, I admit
that I would like to stand on my toes once more,
below the biggest Christmas tree in the world,
and touch our silver star.