My eyes have seen the glory of the stars
Shining in the corners of your smile.
They see the growing solar flare you are
That I have longed to cradle for awhile.
A supernova, fire in your veins
Compacted into star stuff two feet tall
And glorious as nebulae. I gained
A speck within the universe, is all
But you, to me, are galaxies of light
And love of you could fill the sun and more.
My moon and stars, my harbor in the night,
I wait for all the wonder that's in store.
Your story will be sunbeams in the skies,
I know; I see the stardust in your eyes.
I took the hope you offered, clenched in fists
Still dried with blood and tears and without trust.
No matter how I walked, each step was risk
Without the father I had reckoned just.
Forward and still forward into night
So irretrievably the past pressed in;
My heart I'd hid in shadows from your sight
Began to beat in double time. Begin
The work you started, over; carry me
As I have carried love and joy and lost--
But do not lose me, do not lose her: we
Are cradled in a promise, crushed and tossed
Forever in the hands of neutral will
And I am begging love will win out still.
Fair mistress of the skies, demurely,
Oh how she hides her face from those
Who want no more than light, and truly,
A sweet release from dark. She goes
So thoughtless to the bereaved children
Of the light, and will not hear them,
She hides away in bitter gray,
Too long at night, so short a day.
Thus stolen by the southern weather;
We the northern pilgrims wait
And pray she will not tarry late,
For who in his right mind would rather
Choose to live without her light?
Now swift the morning, long the night.
It's out of you whence flows my joy and fear
In equal measure. Life is made of this.
I'm seized with fear and gripped with joy in turn
To know that you are mine and very near.
Your heartbeat next to mine is like a kiss;
Your stirring sets my soul to steady burn.
I feel the weight of days ahead with you--
They're filled with sunlight, midnights, cold and dark
Where sorrow, yes, and grace will both abound.
But wonder is prevailing, worlds made new
In light of fear and joy. You are my spark
Within and all around.
And why the hell unleashed through tiny gates
When heaven is the destined end of us?
Come, answer this: what justice comes too late
To rescue sufferers? Why treat me thus?
Alas, for though you doled out life from trees,
We took bad fruit and unlocked doors to hell
and death and barren wombs and lost the keys.
I am no less than all the rest who fell.
Perhaps I suffer more for all the joy
I've glimpsed through tiny gates whence heaven bleeds.
For all the thief comes nigh yet to destroy
I know the restoration yet precedes.
The door yawns wide beyond the narrow paths,
But why this hell that cuts me off in wrath?
I could not write a sonnet to display
Your earthy auburn eyes or silken hair,
Or your crisp warm smile. Simple words convey
Nothing of your face and what it dares.
And this matters not, for I treasure more
Your flowing laughs and tender clutching hands.
You are possible to me. I adore
Your grinning mind that always understands.
I am sorry for my selfish childish whims.
I am sorry for asking you too much
When I can't be strong for you, and finish
The lies. Candor is weak, my broken crutch.
I have sung to you in silence, and you
Echo back in heartbeats and can't see my truth.
"Just let me drown," he said without a wince.
A warm sea, a warm tea, they are the same.
You left me then, I have not seen you since.
The coffee cup steam seems to spell your name
Curling, dark, and warm--I am embraced
But drowning nonetheless. Come back, I wept.
Perhaps, in retrospect, 'twas my disgrace
To leave you. Just perhaps 'twas I who left.
I don't know. I don't know. All time stands still
Around the teacups, emptied, drained to leaves
Which tell me nothing comforting. Refilled
Again and yet again, at least it breathes
In bracing warm reminders that I sink.
With every sip, "just let me drown," I think.
And here I stand on cliff's edge one last time.
Perhaps I leap; and yet perhaps I climb.
There's no more to be said for where I stand,
In solitude and guarded all around.
The very cosmos may well fill my hands
As I, the two-fold creature on the ground
Look up and see my choices through the storm
Not unaware that nature thrills my soul
As soul and matter touch, lovely and warm
Like trees aflame with God, remaining whole.
You cannot say the soul is all alone
And matter nothing; nor the other way.
For we with both must see and love the known,
Until in light of glory, we decay.