SoMa Literary Review

I wish

By Robert S. O'Brien

I wish tall buildings would cast their shadows
over the canyons of my face
and hide its crags and gullies,
and wounds of time and place --
and for awhile, these things you would not see.

And I wish the everlasting prize
in my life could be to see your eyes
map my body and lift it
into brilliant skies
and red-tailed hawks would look up at me.

When I go, and I will go,
and leave you here behind,
I hope you will remember that
we shared this space in time,
and loved each other.

I wish that you were me
and I was you,
and someday was forever,
and something we will do
somewhere someday together.

But I depend too much on wish,
too much on chance
too much on blind endeavor,
too much on odds
beyond belief
too much on love forever
I wish six easy wishes on this hard day.

Robert O'Brien is re-emerging as a writer of fiction and poetry after thirty years of assignment writing. His story "Trout Fishing in Annapolis" appeared in the December, 2002, issue of SoMa Literary Review. He is currently working full-time on a short novel, "The Wind Tree," which he describes as a love story. "Love and lovers speak a hidden language," he says, "and I broke the code." "I Wish" comes from that work.