Poetry from the Pit

Hope Won’t Die

Not for lack of trying…

Sometimes I really want to kill Hope. Not yours. Not his or hers, Not that woman, over there, named “Hope” — Who names their kid “Hope”?

My parents used to laugh, As I tripped, tall and clumsy, Over my own two feet. “Good thing,” They’d say, “we didn’t name you Grace.”

Or Hope, or Patience, or Prudence, I thought, but never said aloud. Such virtues are not mine, but Hope… It flutters like a hummingbird From the pit of my despair.

I lay traps — sticky, dark and toxic— Laced with anger and annoyance. And yet, It comes at me, comes at me, comes at me — Relentless in its cheery optimism. I glare at it, willing it to drop dead. Secretly, it kills me — but so long as Hope lives, There can be no love ‘twixt me And my betrothed: Acceptance.

So long as Hope breathes within me, Acceptance reeks of Resignation, And Resignation might as well be Death. It is a loveless marriage of convenience, And Hope, thank God, is hard to kill.