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I will not be sorry

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For me, the debt was paid

as I lost myself in a quickening despair

and I turned from my power as

lips turn from a kiss.

I turned from the owls’ graveyard

and sought the burgeoning morning.

I outlasted my own death and woke in water, waterlogged,

unprepared for a dung bug’s misery. I saw daybrids,

but I was not the one who evoked their song.

I saw tall buildings

rising and I could not reach their height.

I walked without rareness,

without command or spell.

I wore an ordinary greyness in the strands

of my once-red hair. I dulled like a sea clogged with sludge. And this,

is how my debt was paid – in grueling undignified amounts.

I thought my clean slate was a brave release. I even planted

a tree and wondered through my raging pain

if it was mightier than simple madness.

In the end, I won what I sought, even with these decalcified bones

and poverty’s prison cell, I found the light in that vision I formed

when I was in the indelible darkness,

thick with longing, guilt and sacrifice, but lacking

the umbilical cord

of praise.

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Copyright © 2008 by Allison Grayhurst

amazon.com/author/allisongrayhurst

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Published in “PoetryMagazine” December 2015

http://www.poetrymagazine.com/editors_choice/general_editor_autumn07.htm

http://www.poetrymagazine.com/editors_choice/winter15_16/allison_grayhurst_page2.html

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Published in “Malevolent Pegasus Literary Zine” October 2015

http://malevolentpegasus.blogspot.ca/2015/10/i-will-not-be-sorry-poem-by-allison.html

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You can listen to the poem by clicking below:

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“Allison Grayhurst intertwines a potent spirituality throughout her work so that each poem is not simply a statement or observation, but a revelation that demands the reader’s personal involvement. Grayhurst’s poetic genius is profound and evident. Her voice is uniquely authentic, undeniable in its dignified vulnerability as it is in its significance,” Kyp Harness, singer/songwriter, author.

“Allison Grayhurst’s poems are like cathedrals witnessing and articulating in unflinching graphic detail the gritty angst and grief of life, while taking it to rare clarity, calm and comfort. Grayhurst’s work is haunting, majestic and cleansing, often leaving one breathless in the wake of its intelligence, hope, faith and love amidst the muck of life. Many of Allison Grayhurst’s poems are simply masterpieces. Grayhurst’s poetry is a lighthouse of intelligent honour… indeed, intelligence rips through her work like white water,” Taylor Jane Green, Registered Spiritual Psychotherapist and author.

Reviews of ‘The Many Lights of Eden’:

“’The Many Lights of Eden’ is a journey: a journey of the heart through youth, anguish, struggle, spiritual awakening, grief, death, love, loss, guilt, struggle, despair, hope, surrender, God, sensuality, imperfection, motherhood, aging, the vanquishing of the devil, indeed, many devils, the inevitable fall from perfection and the casting off of old wineskins for a new one. Perhaps speaking of this book as a chronicle of spiritual maturing would be more accurate, the realization that there is spirituality within imperfection and that handmade temples cannot hope to compete with the spiritual temples within each of us. ‘The Many Lights of Eden’ is a diamond. It is a beautiful collection of insights. Allison Grayhurst’s thoughts and writings are a deep well. Drink from it, for the water is clear and crisp. This collection is a MUST-READ,” Eric M. Vogt, author of Letters to Lara and Paths and Pools to Ponder. 

 “I have been slow at responding to reviews for Allison Grayhurst due to summer’s busy days, however she brings life to each poem, heart to the images and everyone should have a collection of Grayhurst Poetry,” Ann Johnson-Murphree, poet.

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