PINOCCHIO

By Yasen Vedrin

(Pearl Seeker)

Do you recall the ancient story told

About a boy assembled out of wood?

His master breathed a ray of faith so bold –

A miracle in nature, bright and good.

The timid little creature made a start

To get to know this world so wide and grand –

How man is born to love with all his heart

And fights to find a friend in every land.

Pinocchio was a puppet, fair and fine,

Who could walk out without a single thread.

In crowded halls, he’d make the audience shine –

To thieves and rich men, laughter he would spread.

In some terrible, causeless turn of fate,

He soon became a target for all bad.

The tremor of his innocence so great

Suffered from blamed and guilty faults he had.

Both greed and fraud had grabbed him in their stride.

Traps and deceits had tripped his steps away.

And the poor wood within its tragic tide

Knew that his life was heavy day by day.

But with a tiny, single flame of love,

He started walking toward the dark-blue sea.

To save his father, looking up above –

Even if death should set his spirit free.

Into the whale’s terrifying womb

Pinocchio had dived, troubled and deep,

To test his love inside that monstrous gloom

And break the captive hold it wished to keep…

Do you recall the ancient story told

About the wood that turned into a boy?

Perhaps it is repeating, clear and old,

To draw us to its wisdom and its joy?

Love reads us through with its consuming fire.

Let us now catch its word and make it turn.

Perhaps a piece of wood holds our desire –

The secret truth that we were made to burn…