Past Shadows

• Jordan Whyte, Grade 10
• Poetry
• 2007

Days like leaves on a tree are waiting to wither and die.
My past lives in the shadows.
It waits, forever, patiently, secure in the knowledge that all I have done,
and all I have failed to do will come to haunt me when my life is at its end.

When I was younger, I cast aside each day unknowingly, like smoke in the wind.
Nothing was to be regretted, because tomorrow was always there welcoming me with open arms.
The hate and loves forgotten, cuts and bruises forgiven.

As I look over my shoulder to look at the path that I have walked,
I see that it has become tangled and shrouded where the seeds of past actions and half acknowledged sins have begun to grow.
Another follows me along my path.

As I march forward into the future the earth under my feet begins to crackle with
the fallen leaves of the dead days past.
My past is watching me, My past is waiting for me, a monster of my own creation.
The past is waiting for us all.