Pandora

We will box up all the bad in the world

Lock it away, seal it up and place it

In a sacred repository.

Somewhere safe where no harm will come

Nobody will be able to see

The potential damage

The pointless harm

The unheeded destruction

The futile pain.

We will lock it all away

And let the innocent care for this burden.

An obedient child, caring, unsullied, meek,

A child who has not seen the world

A child who will not know the world.

A girl child.

For only she can carry the burdens of the earth

Not knowing the sacrifice

A willing, unwitting pawn.

They gave me a box.

We gave her a box.

“Don’t open it,” they said.

“Don’t open it,” we said.

“You don’t need to know what’s in there,” they said.

She knows better

Than to have a mind of her own.

I know about gifts

They are never any good.

Just ask Silent Cassandra

Or Shrinking Sybil

Or that gormless plank Narcissus

Gifts are never bring happiness.

Not that this was a gift.

More mine to care for.

A beautiful jar, lid held fast,

Heavy, hollow, round.

Whatever could be so horrid

To be held in such an object.

Carefully, I opened the lid.

And my mind went blank.

“Don’t open it we said,

Silly girl. Silly, silly girl.

Only the innocent

Can hold these furies.

Once seen, there is no going back.”

It’s not the hatred or bitterness.

I can cope with the pestilence and war.

Death, riding a horse of no colour

That doesn’t bother me.

Anger, greed, gluttony, sloth

None of these matter.

They escaped, blighting humanity

Like dye dissipates in water.

It’s all part of the fabric of life.

Silly men, silly silly men -

To think a simple jar could hold

The potential damage

The pointless harm

The unheeded destruction

The futile pain.

It’s not what’s out of the jar

That gives the grief.

I look at the jar

Lidless, forlorn.

Inside sits the most awful evils.

I look at the remnants at the bottom of the jar,

Hope and opportunity.

And I weep the tears

Of a million widows.