Ankica Anchie - Poetry cycle
Moderator 
WOMAN IN VOW
a poetic trilogy
“Love is a vow that needs no witnesses,
for time itself confirms it.”
FOREWORD
This trilogy is a voice shaped by waiting,
by devotion that does not demand reward,
by love that learns to remain when all else departs
It is spoken by a woman not as memory,
but as testimony:
that love is not possession,
but endurance;
not fire alone,
but light that does not consume
These poems are not about loss,
but about what survives it
I. THE SONG OF THE WOMAN WHO REMAINS
I received you
as the earth receives rain
in the hour of thirst
Not because you came,
but because you were needed
by my silence
In your name
I clothed my days,
and taught the nights
to be gentle
From your footsteps
I made roads,
and from your weakness
altars of patience
You thought
love was flame
I knew
love was light
that does not burn,
but endures
When you departed,
I did not tear my garments,
nor did I summon the heavens
I entered myself
as one enters a храм,
and laid you there
among prayers
For a woman does not carry a man
only in her arms,
but in time.
And time remembers
what was given
without price
If you should return,
I will not ask
why you left
I will ask
whether you have learned
that love is not taken,
but received
as blessing
II. THE SONG OF THE WOMAN IN VOW
And I received you
as the field receives dew
when the earth splits from thirst
Not because you came,
but because you were needed
by my solitude
In your name
I dressed my days,
and taught the nights their mercy.
From your walking
I shaped paths,
and from your frailty
temples of endurance.
You said:
love is fire.
But I knew:
love is light
that does not consume,
but abides.
When you went from me,
I did not rend my clothes,
nor did I call upon the skies.
I entered my own depths
as into a sanctuary,
and placed you there
among prayers and silence.
For a woman bears a man
not only in her embrace,
but in her days.
And days remember
what was given
without measure and without demand.
If you return,
I shall not ask: where have you walked?
I shall ask instead:
have you learned
that love is not seized by the hand,
but received by the soul
as grace?
III. PSALM OF THE WOMAN WHO WAITS
Blessed be
your coming into my days,
for you came
as water to the desert
and as shade in the heat
In you I found a dwelling,
and in your silence
my voice
From your breath
I made prayers,
and from your wounds
lamps for the night
When you left me,
I did not cry to the heavens,
nor summon the wrath of stars.
I hid your name
within my heart
as seed within the earth
For love is not a cry,
but duration.
Not fire,
but a lamp
that burns without ash
If you return,
I shall receive you with silence
and with the bread of patience
I will not ask where you have been,
but whether you now know
that love is carried
as a vow
and not as a burden
For I was the woman of your path
and the keeper of your name.
And while breath remains in me,
there shall be a place within me
where you were loved
without measure
and without fear
EPILOGUE
And when the years settle
like dust upon old books,
only that remains
which was given without condition
Footsteps are not remembered,
but direction
Words are not remembered,
but the silence in which they were spoken
For love is not what is held,
but what is entrusted to time
and never demanded back
Amb. Ankica Anchie
Humanist, poetessa and writer
Amb. Ankica Anchie
Humanist, poetessa and writer
