Please don’t shine your golden light
on my rained-out parade. Your sunshine
is my shade. Rather than brightening my day,
that glare in my eyes highlights the darkness
around me—darkness you cannot see—and
throws my world’s defects into sharper contrast.
When the peaks of my spirit are enshrouded
by heavy gray clouds, please don’t tell me
you see only a glimmering rosy mist.
I promise you: I can tell the difference.
Instead, whether I am mired in the mud of
an internal swamp or splashing momentarily
through a puddle of dog piss,
trust me enough to be honest with me.
Agree with me that life can be unfair.
Send me some love (or some chocolate).
Take me somewhere outside these four walls,
and let me walk for a while in a world
not of my own devising, where we can talk
about window displays, children’s toys,
or nothing at all. Because sometimes
saying nothing is the best gift there is.
(And, truly, wouldn’t that be easer for you, too?)
Yes. Next time my parade is rained out, because
this is real life and there will likely be a next time,
please: Buy a ticket and join me, or sit that one out.
Because there isn’t room in the exquisitely verdant,
complexly-shaded forest of my current life
for the papier maché trees of too-easy answers.
(c) 2019, by Hannah Six
Set design by Alexandre Benois (1870-1960) for Pavillon d'Armide,
Harvard Theatre Collection, Houghton Library, Harvard University
via Wikimedia Commons
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