Autobiography Of A Tear Poem by Corina Junghiatu

Before I was a tear,
I was the stillness
the heart
could no longer carry.

For a long time I had no face.

I was only a heartbeat
that no longer fit inside itself.

Then I broke free.

I fell into this marketplace,
where hearts are sold by weight,
and people go home
lighter of soul each time.

A man stepped out of time,
his hands like dried roots,
lifted me from the dust —
the only one who still knew
how much a tear weighs.

He held me in his palm
with care,
as though from a single tear
another human being
might yet grow.

No one saw.

People walked on
with windows walled up where their shoulders should be,
their hands so full of things
there was no room left
for a single flicker of feeling.

Since then,
the world no longer ends all at once.
It goes out
each time
a tear falls to the ground
and stays there,
lonelier
than the heart
it broke free from.

@Corina Junghiatu