Amid the falling stone I walk
The sky unfolds itself pearly gray
Almost within reach, its beginning is beyond vision
Fields of immaculate white
Stretching in front of me like a sea of clouds

An eternity rests here in a decaying graveyard
For nothing seems alive but my breath
Stone graves groan under snow, guarded by disfigured stone angels
Old, crumbling and beaten, their carvings are barely visible

Between the white and the gray
I am a black butterfly
I listen to the stillness throbbing and palpitating around me
And contemplate an oak tree

Its branches entangled and entwined©
And columns of smoke rising from a far chimney
Quivering against the pearly gray
I am alone in the whiteness
All alone

A wilted daffodil shivers on your grave
I take it; leave you the warmth of my touch and a secret wish
Sleep distant star; no light shines from your face
No sound escapes from this mute stone
Nothing but the whiteness
Nothing

– Imen Benyoub

© 2014, poem, Imen Benyoub, All rights reserved; illustration, the angel Gabrail from the 14th Century “The Wonders of Creation, The  Oddities of Exhistance” Zakariya al-Qazwini, public domain