BLACK RIBBON

I've been called to celebrate several funerals over the past week (and next). Today, we honoured a man whose life was a highway, literally - a big rig, truck driver. I found this poem by Daniel Audet to read at the Memorial Service: Black Ribbon.

The glimmering black ribbon stretches before me,
reaching into endless darkness far ahead, begging I follow -
follow unspoken promises of returning into new born light.
On its' back I run.

Fearsome, ancient mountains, pushed outward from her raging host,
deep scars slashed in her earthen flesh, never healing,
open wounds parting the landscape upon which black ribbons lay.
Her silent agony grants me passage.
On her back we run.

Wood and steel stabbed through bloodless shoulders.
Words and pictures speak of destinations, renewal.
Towers of glass and stone shield the roving masses.
Reaching, seizing, always more.
False prophets of light fracture the sky, pushing back a hidden night.
My black ribbon a refuge from the void of souls.
On its' back I run.

Hearts exiled,
infinite returns to the end of our beginning,
witnesses to meaningless, faceless seasons.
Tortured whispers, embraced by loves tears, fall.
The black ribbon.
On its' back we run.

The glimmering black ribbon stretches before me,
reaching into endless darkness far ahead, begging I follow,
follow unspoken promises of returning into new born light.
Until I can run no more.
On its' back I run.