One Step from Disaster
One step from disaster,
one moment of clarity passed,
one realization there is no going back,
one crystal clear empty glass,
and the cold shudder of truth rings loudly
in the silence of eternity,
all arrows at a grieving heart bereft,
poised to bleed, no secrets kept,
just a fate derived by one’s own hand,
while our common sense slept.
One slip on a key,
one deletion in slow motion cast,
one panicked response to seal
what was meant to last,
but in a brain-freeze, a momentary blackout,
a mistaken command
did sought my treasure out,
and in one fowl swoop
let all those words out, in flight
amid a boundless cyberspace.
For hours I cleaned, gleaned
every drop of information,
collecting back ups and files in hibernation,
books I’ve written, manuscripts
driven to the point of format
in printed editions,
and slowly I retrieved a modicum of the lost,
thousands of writing files, twenty years at cost,
from one single act of mental lapse,
one oversight my loss.
If it weren’t for publishers,
print guys and hard disk files,
my work would be dead,
and I, a vacant profile,
for who can attest twenty years of work,
so closely guarded, yet so easily squandered,
a tenuous hold on a creative mind’s cost,
when all our children
freed on the page,
suddenly become homeless, lost.
It was not a good day, I’ve had better,
and it so chillingly reminds me
what I have achieved,
so now my heart can beat again,
at least my poetry is thrice backed up,
in case of my stupidity,
perhaps its a kick I needed,
to never assume or take for granted what we do,
its now time for a few changes,
so this writers life can ensue.
Tony DeLorger © 2018
videos on YouTube and book sales on website thoughtsforabeautifulmind.com, Amazon and digitalprintaustralia.com.au/bookstore
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Oh what a devastating feeling to think so much work has been lost. I hope you got it all back and tomorrow will be a much better day for you, Tony. Take care, dear friend,
I lost over ten thousand files, some of which were backed up, but I’m not really sure what I’ve lost. The books are all at the printer’s on disk so if nothing else I have those. Thankfully my poetry is in a separate location and hard copy backed as well. Gave me such a fright though. Cheers!
Frightening indeed, Tony. Can you restore your computer to the day before you lost those files?
I’ve done that Phyllis, but no, the files are gone. I’ve resurrected what I could, but I’ll never know how much I’ve lost. The necessities I can get back as I said, books etc with a printer, But the rest, gone.
Sorry to read of your loss Tony. I’ve made errors on my keyboard at times but nothing of this magnitude. So easy to do with the slip of one digit. I have a continual download plugged into mine saving all work placed there. Im hapoy though that all your poetry and books were salvaged. Time to consider a back up system indeed.
Thanks Vincent, yes I need another external hard drive. The two I have are filled with TV series and movies. All is not lost. Cheers!