Much earlier this year, I posted a short, one-stanza poem to the Yahoo S&H gen list and then later to the BCL. Although it was well-received, the piece never felt complete to me. And every time I tried to add to it, the new lines seemed forced and stilted. So, recently I revisited it, and here is the result.

The episode: "Sweet Revenge." The setting: Starsky's hospital room. The time: Those first anxious, yet hopeful, days after Starsk has awakened from his coma. The mood: Tentative optimism balanced by expectant fear and remembered sorrow.

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters from "Starsky and Hutch." I do occasionally borrow them, but never with fraudulent intent or with an eye to monetary gain.

Forever in a Breath

By e-pony

How I account for time has changed.

Seconds, minutes, hours

Have lost their powers

To amaze.

And weeks and days

Have lost all meaning.

Now I measure life, breath by breath.

Each exhalation in between, I count a little death.

And every inhalation,

Has become a resurrection.

xxx

I watch, with eyes afraid to close,

Your anxious, dream-filled sleep.

Wakeful terrors keep

My mind from rest,

And nightmares test

My last reserves.

Yet, still I mark the moments, beat by beat –

The precious pulse of life, with hope in each repeat.

And my silent, sad reflection,

Regards this fragile benediction.

xxx

An eternity times the span

Between each quiet breath,

Suspended life and death –

Suspended pain.

The soft refrain

Of sighing sleep

Continues with its sweet reprise: in and out;

Inspires here a slender faith – expires doubt.

And still each steady susurration

Imparts its living affirmation.