Speechless Sorrow Poem by Lynn W. Petty

Speechless Sorrow



I have read in Legends of Monastic Orders,
The Great Saints found ecstasy in the pain endured
For the love of their spiritual convictions.
I found no ecstasy in my pain.
I found only irredeemable gloom hanging over the entire air terminal.
I observed an emotional hurt so deep it spilled over,
Flooding the hearts of all who witnessed its debilitating affect.
Our son, the father of our grandchildren, wept with a faint, melancholy, rueful, passionate weeping, so painful to see,
It was like the stabbing of an already lacerated heart.
Hugging his children, he, with heart full of speechless sorrow,
Released his girls to the stewardess, and with a sort of mental depletion, wiped his tears and sighed in liquid grief.
The children's sobs were so deep their souls seemed to break
Loose from their bodies and leak, with overflowing, through their eyes.
Quaking with repressed anguish, for our son and grandchildren,
Their grandmother and I stood in silence as if in deep bereavement.
Upon the departure of the girls, we three stood together in a small group, looking out the window, like Christians huddled on the Coliseum floor.
We watched as the plane disappeared from our view, feeling
We had been eviscerated by the hunger-maddened lions
Of divorce.

POET'S NOTES ABOUT THE POEM
Divorce, the lion in the coliseum.
COMMENTS OF THE POEM
Bri Edwards 07 February 2016

“Our son, the father of our grandchildren, wept with a faint, melancholy, rueful…” [this must be my week for reading “rue/rueful”. I’m trying to read a lot of PH friends’ poems to make up for lost time while I was away. this is the third poem in two or three days in which I’ve found “rue” or “rueful”. hmmm? oh, I’m getting sidetracked! ] ah! “divorce”! ! I’ve been through three, but never had anything close to misery accompany them. I was one of the lucky ones! (only once was a child involved and then things went pretty smoothly) Perhaps the poem would have more impact on some readers if “divorce” were the first (not last) word. I spent a bit of time trying to figure out what made everyone SO rueful. and I didn’t get the part about daughters/granddaughters being released to stewardess ……until the last word raised its “ugly head”. bri :) my condolences

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Lynn W. Petty

Lynn W. Petty

Newport Beach, California
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