The Juniper Tree

There is a place beneath the world's tree
where the deepest griefs and wrongs go —
kept alive by those who will not forget:
so that, in time, a bird hatches from
the roots and rises to sing the tale
of what happened — to sing until
the wrong is set right, the death undone,
and all who suffered receive balm.
(But this is only a story…)
So the murdered boy returned home
to live what remained of childhood
with a charmed vulnerability.
After, his chances matched the rest —
save that, having passed beyond death,
he met with life more freely than most,
and, being so steeped in suffering,
found present pain could often
be healed by memory… Knowing
so well the end of all stories,
did he become a teller of them —
a tranced presence beside hearths,
nourisher of firelit faces —
unfolding the path through ordeal
with confidence, with a serene air
speaking of death, and revealing
at last, the seed of hope — as if
holding a resin bead up to catch
the burning light, then passing it —
with the body of a small moth inside —
passing it unharmed through
the candle's liquid gold tongue?