Copyright © Diane L. Schirf

I saw a heart upon the ground
Yellow, torn, sick, dying, dead.
I thought it was mine.
“Who killed my heart?”
I asked the sky, the earth, the sun.
I asked the moon and the stars.
I asked the birds.
I asked the insects.
I asked all the animals.
And the flowers.
I spared none my grief, my loss.
None knew
Who killed my heart.
Finally, I asked a great tree.
The tree looked down upon my heart.
“It is not your heart.”
“It is not?”
“It is mine.”
And so it was.

Leaf and veins, dead and decayed.
I still have my heart.
(I believe.)
But now it truly grieves
Not for itself
But for another.
It is well at last.

2005