It is a challenging post at which she’s been stationed
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| (C) Kedralynndeviatart.com, on "Tears on My Pillow" Facebook page |
all these many tours of duty. It’s true, for most,
a foreign land becomes, in time, a home,
the customs and the language second nature,
all the children of the region cheerful messengers of love.
Above the treeline in their seat of power, all the older ones
appreciate the service, even saying so.
The elders of the village welcome such a one with friendship,
frank in their approval and their gratitude for what it represents.
Instead, her discontent has grown quite honestly,
her station less inviting with each passing week.
Uniquely, with potential enemies abounding,
it is loneliness she battles on her rounds
as bitter cold blows through and makes a liar of the sun.
When day is done, she offers her request with silent tears…
a transfer, please, or even just a break… that so far, reach
no further than the dawn. Despite the time that has elapsed
until her rising, her pillow still is damp when morning comes.
She clothes herself inside a uniform that used to fit and
greets the day, confident that she will meet, once more,
the numerous requirements of this post that is her trust,
today and then the next and then the next,
until one day, perhaps, someone will come with news
that all the battles have been fought. The war is won.
She’s free to go. A victory!
Until then, she will ask and ask and ask again for one thing only:
A post where she is needed. Wanted. Where she can sleep
at night, her pillow dry because her dreams have all come true.
(c) Ellen Gillette, 2022
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