Sonnet

Men have shown they prefer darkness.
To the light.
I was overwhelmed with tiredness.
I dreamt and something new was opened to my sight.

I was a passenger in a car, the past dismissed, and from it came no survivor.
Absorbed in my own thoughts, a long dreary list.
Only at the end, when it was too late did I recognise that here was no cab driver.
Dead for 26 years yet every detail of his dear face so clear, it was my father so missed.

Full of regret and still dreaming, I came to a bookshop.
Strangely open in lockdown, piled high inside and out with every kind of book.
There was an old lady there who showed me two wartime ID cards, I let them drop.
The writing was faded, only photos remained, I didn’t even bother to look.

The past is a bottomless ocean of regrets.
Do not let it go, these are holy assets.

Haiku

The past is truly
An ocean of regrets
Do not let it go