Pegasus Poem by Suzanne Hayasaki

Pegasus rears in a clearing
In the woods behind an old chateau
Abandoned in a decadent century
When gentlemen hunted on horses with hounds.

The estate abounds with tiny lives
Scurrying beneath fallen leaves
Flitting like weavers' shuttles
Through the warp of the forest canopy.

And yet Pegasus stands fixed
Upon a moss-covered rock
As if fastened in place by some god
Displeased with his infidelity.

I wonder which Muse he forsook
Or who he refused to allow to ride him.
I wonder if his own light died inside
Leaving him flightless and finally silent.

Sometimes I feel my own wings stiffen.
I feel the weight of my age
I feel an intellectual inertia set in,
Threatening to leave me as motionless as stone.

But then I hear some new voice speak to me.
I feel a friendly hand run down my flank.
I pick up on an urgency beneath his patience.
I sense a repressed energy in his gentleness.

And something tells me that I can stand alone
Until my hooves fuse with the rock beneath me
Or I can carry this stranger wherever he needs to go
In hopes that he will show me something I need to see

To shatter the brittle layer of cynicism that has encased me
Since I began to let the worst of the world blind me to its true beauty.