POEM: The Misplaced Light

The Misplaced Light

(to past relationships)

I have misjudged the weight of my own wanting —

followed the wrong door down its dark road,

walked through a stranger’s eyes still hunting —

and carried back the empty load.

After bleeding I see clear:

the forest stood entire

and I bent to read a single leaf.

I called you destiny—you were a fire

burning my map and leaving only grief.

You are our past life — this pale and fading ghost—

walking the woods of what almost was.

I could see you in the future I want most

but will not touch, I’d bleed again,

the glass is too thin.

Past love: You are all rose.

You are all thorns inside it.

The calm waiting behind breaking waves.

A light I carried wrong. I have to hide it

back inside the earth,

digging my own heart’s grave.

You are the one I did not meet this life.

I do not know what country keeps you,

what name you carry, whether peace or strife —

I only know the last life,

and never the now.

—

I have the crying tree and the mangled bush,

the sea’s salt waiting with its cold and clear,

the tide taking me back without a rush,

drowning me slow in spite of my muffled scream,

the gulps of salt.

I have the birds not asking my name,

the sun dropping its gold into my hair—

I have this solitary, difficult, exacting thing.

I have the animal world, wild and free,

whose many faces open like an invitation:

witnesses asking for nothing back.

I am alone. But then again — I always was.

The dying candle doesn’t mourn its own light’s death—

It burns until ending,

because that is the only thing to do.

Fade.

Marni Fraser

04-29-2026

Image of me by Sadie | 2026