crystalnacht
Fractlous the fracture
Faceting the glassware
Sharding the crystal
A cobweb of shatter lines
Like the most fretwork
Of networks.
Splinter glass
In brittle flinders
Smash to pieces
The transparent tracery
Razor sharp and filigree
A lacing of frost
Or the ice, starcrossed.
The shivered image
Refracted
To a thousand shard lights
Or pin points
Dazzling the eye
And leaving an imprint
- Like your arrow
Through the mirror -
The surface that held
And exchanged each image
Each most elusive of
Glancing thoughts,
Thoughtful glances
One to the other
Placed around it.
That ideal globe
You turned from
With never a glimpse
Backward -
Do you see the lights
Reflected on
The bricks ahead?
Or did the crystalnacht
Leave you blinded?
This poem first appeared in Nightingale magazine - in print, and later online.
Photograph - ‘The Crystal Shatters’ by S.V.Wolfland
Text and image © S.V.Wolfland. All rights reserved.