The Absence of Pain

The Absence of Pain

– R. A. P.

For one breath. One moment.
It stops.

I close my eyes and think
of other sudden stops and gentle endings:
the silence after the last measure
the amen after a prayer for serenity
morning glories in the brightness of noon
the flight of birds before a storm
a train whistle at two o’clock in the morning
the moment after the credits roll.

I wonder again:
Can that moment be held?
When the credits roll,
can I walk out of the darkness
and go gentle, away from the pain?
Would that be the sudden start of the end of it?

No.
I know what I wish I didn’t—
pain doesn’t end that way.
Not finally. Not just like that.
I have to breathe in the moments between,
knowing:
when it leaves, it will come back—
never finished and always rough,
like the last line of a poem
I’ll spend my life rewriting.