your blinded hand

 

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Suppose that 
everything that greens and grows 
should blacken in one moment, flower and branch. 
I think that I would find your blinded hand.

Suppose that your hand and mine were lost among numberless cries 
in a city of fire when the earth is afire, 
I must still believe that I would find your blinded hand. 

Through flames everywhere 
consuming earth and air 
I must believe that somehow, if only one moment were offered, 
I would 
find your hand. 

I know as, of course, you know 
the immeasurable wilderness that would exist 
in the moment of fire. 

But I would hear your cry and you’d hear mine and each of us  
would find 
the other’s hand. 

We know 
that it might not be so. 
But for this quiet moment, if only for this 
moment 
and against all reason 
let us believe, and believe in our hearts, 
that somehow it would be so. 

I’d hear your cry, you mine – 
And each of us would find a blinded hand.


—Tennessee Williams

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