Pedestal Shadows Poem by Henrietta Ezegbe

Placed high,
on a pedestal carved from admiration,
words like gilded offerings,
eyes that saw only brilliance.

For a time, the world felt luminous,
each glance a benediction,
each smile a halo drawn in flesh.

The intoxicating light consumed them entirely,
believing it was infinite,
believing it was theirs to hold.

Then the pedestal cracked,
slow at first, tiny fissures in awe,
then wider, crueler,
until the same eyes that once adored
now cut with a precision
that the heart had no shield for.

Wickedness tasted worse
because it was unexpected,
because adoration had been a lens
through which the world seemed safe.

Better, they thought, to have been met
with honest indifference from the start,
than with the betrayal of reverence.

And yet, even in the ruins,
a trace of the old light remains,
not for them, not for anyone,
but to remind the soul
that it once shone
and will shine again.