poem

Hopes and Wishes

A poem about yearning, numbness, hope, and the exhaustion of wanting what has not yet arrived.

Hopes and Wishes

I want to be done with hopes and wishes

The present yearning for immaterial futures

They say that hope is resilient, hard to kill

Perhaps that is good, for survival's sake

But sometimes I feel it is monstrous

Like a cancer that creeps and spreads

And always rears its insidious head again

Just when you think you finally stamped it out

I want to stop hoping that they will arrive

The me I've hoped and wished for oh so long

I've gutted that hope before many times

Dealt it mortal blows it couldn't sustain

And for a while the monster is vanquished

There is a void, an emptiness, a frost

Filling the space where I was previously

And it is not wholesome or satisfying

But at least it is not painful, it is numb

And what is numb can be ignored

But then come the phantom aches and pains

Like a severed limb with nerves still felt

A quiet kindling of hope, a small resistance

They whisper that there is more than numb

But I tell them to shut up and leave me be

(I know better—always their same pathos)

Because all I've found beyond the frost

Is painful longing and bitter disappointment

They may stay quiet for a bit thereafter

But the damage is already done

The spark of hope waters dormant seeds

Wishes sown atop unfulfilled desires

And soon they sprout and flower

Wafting scents that beckon and draw

Their poisonous ambrosia causes amnesia

An oh-so temporary forgetfulness

Of what lies beyond the coldness

Tricking the weeder into becoming a farmer

Whereafter he toils in the fields of wishes

He clears the obstructions of river hope

And diverts its waters to increase the bounty

At the end of the season though

There is nothing on the vines to harvest

Hope still courses along

The weeds of wishes still abound

But the crop he needed is not to be found

How then can you fault the farmer

For cursing hopes and wishes?

Perhaps I go to burn the fields today

And then from there to dam the river

Perhaps a few more salty tears in the soil

Will be enough to avert future generations

Will be enough to make peace with winter

Perhaps I go to kill the monster today

Hoping this time they won't return.

Behind this piece

About

A poem about the exhaustion of hope when longing has gone unmet for too long.

This piece explores the painful tension between hope as a source of survival and hope as something that can begin to feel cruel when it repeatedly opens the heart toward disappointment.

Through images of frost, fields, seeds, rivers, and monsters, the poem moves through a desire not simply to stop wanting, but to stop being hurt by wanting.

Insight

Hope is often spoken about as an uncomplicated virtue.

But this poem came from a place where hope did not feel gentle, inspiring, or noble. It felt invasive.

There are seasons when hoping for something that has not arrived begins to feel like being asked to keep reopening the same wound. Numbness can start to seem merciful by comparison, even if it is not truly peace.

What interests me now is that the poem never fully escapes hope.

Even the final line is still hoping.

That feels honest to me. Sometimes we do not know how to stop wanting what we want. Sometimes we resent hope precisely because some part of us still believes it.

This poem holds that contradiction without resolving it.

Details

Author: Bryce George

Kind: poem

Written: March 2024

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