PANDORA

she lifts the lid on the box of day
and it comes out blue,
with silver linings

and there's no hint of anything
but jade leafed summers
where she runs to play

while her mother smiles
the smile reserved
for a happy daughter:this is

pandora in the morning.
how could things go that far astray
with so little warning

I wondered when I read one day
the child sized legend that made me want
to slam the lid shut tight on everything

just to be safe.

and was it just a trick of light
in that wild future where you
lost the singing world, delight,

and caused our plight
merely by

not hearkening to your mother?
finding suddenly [and too late
to close the gate

the infinite things that sting
though you mean
no harm

just at your play in the Beautiful
doing what you always did
till it all turned drastic

so fantastically, irrevocably.

why couldn't the winged fairy Hope
be the only one who rose or why
couldn't she have summoned rainbows

or batallions
that day from the things too deeply stored
and too ignored

and packed away; why couldn't there be
a lock so strong to lock out all the
hurt and wrongs to follow

I wondered, wondered even as a little girl
told in my turn, not to wander;
not to wonder too much.

where was the path backwards
I wanted to say
to unclouded joy when you were free

as the seas in your brief brightness
happy about the house with the pillars
of trellised vines.

this was the dream her mother had ever after

well who can say when
the charm wears off the toy,
the little idols made of clay.

that day or any other.

and a shadow
crosses the Sun.

mary angela douglas 22 february 2016