Boxes

Watching the Invictus Games I was inspired by the stories of incredible people who have experienced and continue to experience, horrendous pain and suffering with such determination and dignity.

I have my own challenges, we all do, but listening to the testimonies made by people with PTSD and other invisible injuries spurred me on to write the following poem. I can’t advocate this approach, but it is the approach I used until I realised that I was using cardboard boxes, and they crumble with age. At that point I talked, and found hope…
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Boxes

Sometimes,
Just occasionally,
a scent,
a shadow in the periphery
let's slip a memory
that leaves me stunned.
Numbed.

Pandora had one box,
I have many;
rubble,
teachers - predators,
torture, beatings, burnt feet,
silent screams in the night
choked back, concealed
and children taught to kill.

We're told a peek loosed all evils
yet one remained confined.
With Elpis* tightly locked away
I'll strive to keep my boxes shut,
for,
if I were to lift a lid,
there'd be no hope for me.

John Carré Buchanan
22 May 2016

* In Greek mythology Elpis was the personification and spirit of hope or expectation,