Your golden hair shining in the sun
As you're bounding over the waves
Body glistening, muscles flexing as you run
The beauty of this moment rejuvenates and saves


Along the sandy shores of Lake Ontario
In the land where the sky and waters meet
We play catch with the Frisbee and crank up the car stereo
And romp until you’re panting to the beat


I remember the day  when I first met you
Among the napping huddling heap
Ignoring the others, you sat on my shoe
Pawing me, while your brothers fell fast asleep


So selfless, so smart, so easy to teach
You would whisper, and crawl, and back up and weave
Lily, my lovely, don't go, I beseech you,
Stay just a bit longer here, Lily; don't leave

Flashback...




We'd spent all day
In "the fields"
Not twenty yards from the whitewashed cemetery fence posts
Floating and then burning
Paper boats on a muddy puddle in a depression in the dirt

Phillip and Chris scored some Skoal From Danny or Billy, I forget which...
It was "long-cut"

We try a bit...putting it in our cheek
Like the big kids did
The Skoal making a strange and potent tea from our spit

The smallest amount of this tingly elixer is swallowed- and it's over.

I lose my lunch.
I am yawning in technicolor.

Chris and Phillip laugh and laugh.  
Then Phillip follows suit barfing on his shoes
Chris gives him an arm punch, with a smile.
I think Phil and I were both done with chew.

There was never a shortage of things to do here

Under an old barnwood board, was a magazine with glorious pictures that made us feel strangely isolated
From one another

We would memorize each line, each curve
For later when each would be alone
With the Sears catalog and some tracing paper.

We made single line trails for our bikes
With banks and jumps
Chris was the daredevil of the bunch
He would take a new ramp at top speed

His little brother would too
Sometimes with drastic results
Concussions and broken bones.

There's a chain store now
in the spot we called  "the fields". 

It used to seem vast.  
And now it looks small.
But that is the past.
Memories. That's all.

\



Your beautiful heart has a tiny little hole
Goin’ b’bap-bim-boom boom-bap...b’bap
The mitral-valve-prolapsed leaky little hole
It goes ba-***-bap, bitty-bap, rat-ta tat tat

Instead of the traditional ba-dum, ba-dum
And aside from the fact that I like the beat
There’s another reason, baby, I like you, (yum)
Why I lay myself down at your ivory feet

It’s not because your heart sound like a drum
Or the fact your soul shines bright and true
It’s not just the *** tuh-tum tum tum
...It’s because I have a hole in my heart too

Words seem to fail me, as I trudge on through...
The deafening, stinging wind and hailstones are flying
I haven't direction, but not for lack of trying...
Praying, reading, crying out...what else can I do?

Quench the nagging thirst that comes quickly with each expression
Quicken now a sure belief when all falls down around us
Bring to mind the fervent feelings from when love first found us
Heal this mess that stains us all; accept contrite confession

Heal this mess of pain that these stark storms have brought
Heal this tragic tangle pulling friends and family under
Soothe and salve the sickness and the strange and savage plunder
Do I really need to ask it, with all that death has wrought?

The woman I love is a magnificent creature
Caring and bearing so much, ...so much
When we met I thought there is so much to teach her
But quickly was I her student and such

Magnificent lessons learned I from this being
Touching and sharing I really can't say
What makes a bright angel, bejeweled in splendor,
Take a bent, broken creature, bedeviled, ...to stay

^

I rise with a start and begin the routine

Waltzing down the stairs



And the pain is there

Like a beacon repeating



Stark and clean

In the October air



And the pain is there

Like a beacon repeating



But I relish, for now,

Each sprain and tear



And the warmth that awaits

And my lungs filled with air



Now each creak and pin

Make alarms sound within



But the pain is a friend

That will ward-off the end



With each crunch and stumble

I resign to the fumble



I’m thankful I’m here

Despite wince and tear



I lean into the pain,

The pulp, and the fear


^