By Don Kenton Henry

What sound does a heart make when it breaks

Is it as quiet as the breath that now you cannot take

Or . . . as the goodbye you never heard

Is it the sound of the fluttering broken wing of a bird as it struggles in vain to fly

While you watch helplessly as your broken heart joins in arrhythmic sync with it

In what seems its own attempt not to die

What difference between your heart and the broken sparrow on this cold December day

Love and nature can be hard on all God’s creatures

Is it the sound of a room once full of furniture

And the life and love of family

Now vacant of wood, fabric, leather and laughter

Echoing of as though of the lone Chaplain’s footsteps on an empty hospital hallway long past the midnight hour

Is it the sound of frozen tears dropping on a China plate

The tink when they shatter after falling from your face

Or more like icicles falling off the eaves of a roof

Which crash then shatter loudly

And you take this as proof

That is the sound a heart makes when it breaks

What is the sound hope makes when it leaves your heart

Is it the sound of a ship’s mainsail, one moment full and tight

The next, canvas collapsing on itself as its life breath , the wind . . . dies

Is that the sound love makes when it decides to depart

Or is it the echo of her laughter or a kind word that she said

Each one you play over at night as you lie in your bed

Saddened by the emptiness where just nights before lay her head

Such a short time ago her scent still lingers on the pillow

And you wonder when dreams die . . . just where do they go

Oh, hazel eyes, I miss you

Oh, hazel eyes, what I would give to kiss you

Once more

Oh, what I would give to write the poetry I promised you

To read the stories I had yet to read . . . and the ones which I would write for you

To put you in them like some long lost Russian ballerina who stole a school boy’s heart

To dance the dances we would have danced

To travel the miles to Rome and Paris I would have traveled with you

To feel the smiles we would have smiled along the way

This is the picture a bard had painted on his open poet heart he wished to share with you

Words unspoken, tales untold, dances left undanced, smiles left unsmiled, love ungiven

Oh, soft and gentle hazel eyes

Nothing to be forgiven

And nothing will be forgotten

Good-night

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