Rhythm

My chest breaks rhythm.
Where once steady,
is now staccato.
Where once was hope,
is now moving, growing,
taking me to a place,
known and unknown.

I wait,
cling hard with a grip to my self,
to lessen the blow of what may greet me;
after constraint, loss, loneliness and futile hope,
cutting to darkness, silence,
a quiet that beckons, and horrifies.

But peace is not quiet and quiet is not peace.
Life cannot be only these,
when there is land cacophonous and verdant;
forests and valleys steeped in song.
I yearn to sing my own;
to feel in my chest,
its steady rhythm.