Sunshine and Rain

Image by DeepAI.org

The drug I wrote about here was no chemical nor weed, it was depression. Something I suffered, at times, in those days. Yet there was always something inside me that told me that I could rid myself of it. In this poem I put it down to music. In particular the piano playing Rubén Gonzalez and subsequently the voice of Ibrahim Ferrer. Mother Nature too, always brought me through. It is everything around us, that we love, that helps us and that makes us remember that it is all worthwhile.

Dark, crispy blackness pierced by a myriad of jewels
and the wisp of a crescent moon refuels
my soul, and disperses the pain that I try to hide,
but the pain is often greater than my pride.
As I walk through the forest at night, so late,
in the deep darkness I hallucinate.
The drug is in me, within me, pushing me to the edge
squeezing out my strength with the thin end of a wedge.

Yet, something deep inside is determined to win
and after a long, dark struggle I begin
to see the silver light of the stars
and the tiny red ball of Mars
and from the depths of my hallucination
comes an unexpected revelation…
Mellow music whispers in my ears –
dispelling all sadness and fears.

The sweet tumbling keys of González ramble through my mind,
subtle percussion and melancholic bass that bind,
with the velvet, caring voice of Ferrer
which resonates love through the satin, midnight air.
I look up at that wonderful, indigo sky
and no longer do I ask myself why.
Cuban sounds of hope, fervour and passion,
too classic to be just a fashion,
rivet their way through my thought.
And it’s then that I really ought
to stay on those harmonious tracks
but the drug never ever seems to relax
and I hear, suddenly, the sadness of their tune
so I look up and I see the moon
is covered in ominous clouds of grey
and know that this is the inevitable way
that I spiral down, and down, to the ground.
Although beauty and love is just all around
and I feel that it touches me
all I can do is to see
the dark silhouettes of the trees
and all I hear is a whispering breeze.

Rubén and Ibrahim are melancholy too
they see the same beauty as I often do
they feel it too much, and it causes them pain –
life is both sunshine and rain.

***

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