why have i waited for so long

why have i waited for so long
the shadows were with me all along
i was looking for you, but you,
like stilt roots, were supporting
a big roof there
under which a nursery of young saplings
needed you, now that the gate is open
and the saplings have grown up,
will you return to the same cave
in which ancient paintings by our ancestors
reminded us
of talking through
art, form, lines and colours
lest langauge limits what we have to say
had to say,
still say