"NEED" A POETIC PERSPECTIVE

I Need

by Errol Strider

I need to shed my longing in the spring;

And bare my heart in the forlorn mist of lonely winters

To discern in autumn the wisdom of death

And in summer to remember the seasons of barrenness.

I need to voice my yearning in the twilight,

To affirm my identity at dawn

To perceive that suns don't stand still at noon,

Nor do stars wane in the blue of sleep.

I need to be touched in the mid of morning,

And to be recharged in the lull of afternoons;

To be lifted out of myself when the sun begins to set,

And to be made humble and thankful as first rays sift over the horizon.

I need to engender a feeling of trust in the waking hours of men,

And to not be deceived by sleep masquerading as death,

But to grasp the erectness of meanings that stretch out into heaven,

To know substance and essence well as behavior and form.

I need to understand myself revealed in the faces of men,

And to not judge them by their surface and shadows

For in the finding of cause for behavior that mars,

I see myself struggling to grow.

If I look beyond the barriers my brother erects,

I see him saying, too,

"I have need to be filled."

To Errol is Human