…dancing in the wind

We are all shadows, dancing in the wind
fragile and insubstantial, untethered yet anchored
listening to the ticking clock sounding out into emptiness
its echoes circling us like prey
we are ever hidden from the light
at best we are silhouettes that occasionally overlap
at worst we disappear in the light
only to return in the dying of the day
we exist in various shades of darkness
painfully stretched by an unforgiving sun
we cannot move yet are constantly displaced
mere projections, interventions that we cannot resist
we live in three dimensions, rarely seen for who we are
painted as ghosts, we are our own emotional blind spots
the we, we do not want to see
created by the non-transparent, the opaque, the absence of light
this is our lineage from which we are birthed
yet we are reliant upon the light to survive
day turns to night, night turns to day
with every tick and every tock we tremble unseen
shifting and stretching as if freedom is just within reach
aching to escape the cycle, but there is no hope
just as the shadows of every season
we exist as long as the earth has a sun
for it is written in the sacred texts
and there is no undoing it
© Ann Bagnall