The Box

What lies within the box, unseen,  
a token lost, a thought pristine?  
Or merely air, a void serene?  

Does it hold time, a clock unwound,  
a moment trapped, a silence found?  
Or echoes lost where none astound?  

Could it be dreams of lives once led,  
flickering ghosts a life long dead?  
Or hopes unwoven, stitched with thread?  

Might it contain the stars of yore.  
The cosmos bound behind this door?  
Infinity within its core?  

Or is it but the simplest guise,  
a trick played out before our eyes?  
To make us seek where nothing lies?  

Perhaps it holds no grand display.  
Just mundane things, a child's dismay,  
A lesson lost in life's ballet.  

Could it be truth, the ultimate key,  
unfolding depths of mystery?  
Or truth that’s gone a fallacy?  

Maybe it waits for hands to dare,  
to break its seal, to strip it bare.  
The whisper’d cost. A soul’s despair.  

And yet we ask, we yearn, we pine  
to solve the riddle cross the line,  
To claim the spark: "This box is mine."  

But does it matter what's inside?  
The question burns, it won’t subside.  
For curious hearts the world’s too wide.  

Pandora's hands, so soft, so frail,  
unlatched the box, released the wail...
The world would turn to be her jail.

A rattle; a shudder.
I turn and face... nothing.
For a fleeting moment,
Confusion reigns.
I pause, then pick up
The threads of today.  
A life - infused with colour,
Discourse, demands and distractions -
Drowns out what I know deep down is real.
Later, in the stillness,
It beckons me again,
Only this time in silence.
A presence rather than a sound
Draws me back towards the box.
It's been a while;  
I'd almost dared to hope
Its grip on me had vanished;
That the power within had died.
 
When those weary days were done,
I placed them all inside the box.
Their minutes spent; their hours full -  
Too full to hold inside one mind;
Too intense for a mortal to contain
Their colours rich and dark
As images swirled and merged and pooled like blood.
Summer scenes of countryside and friends
Turned ghoulish on the pages
As the ink spread out to reveal
The images of nightmares.
I picked them up and folded them together,
Their burnished edges catching at my fingers
Even as I gently folded the pages,
Stroking them closed
As though to calm the horrors within.
I placed them in the box
With plenty of space to breathe.
I sealed the box with steely threads
Fashioned from Determination and Will,
Then tucked it away on top of a cupboard
Where it would now remain
Quite pacified; no longer volatile.
And then, with time,
It grew silent, still.
The pages' fractious energy was spent -  
Burnt out -  
And life could once again resume.
 
I stand, and pace the room
Face upturned to survey the box.
Its contents draw me inexorably:
They will not rest
Until I reach inside
And view them once again
In the fresh light of today.
I tremble now, unsure what I will find.
Have the colours mellowed with age;
The images composed themselves  
With the benefit of hindsight?
Or will those pages once again unleash
The horrors they once held?
One thing I know for sure:
I will crack open the box
And peek through cautious fingers at the pages within
Before they burst their shackles
And explode from the box all by themselves.
 
So this is how it goes:
All that is left to do is be courageous
And to open it.

 



is the one
you placed
your soul in

 
Well, fancy that!  
It's Schrödinger's Cat!  
 
😻