I need to plug into your symphony
listen for the strains of your heart
pull myself apart from my tense doing
slow down, dive deeper, below the surface,
then ride the ripples to the distant shore
of your gentle, loving soul.

So many great stories of people leaving home
to find a place home enough
where they could find themselves
become more,
someone extraordinary.

Most of my life has been such a quest.
Like butterflies I emerged from cocoons
after staying a while in a place to grow
into something or someone
I could live with.

I was lucky to find people along the way
strong enough to hear my voice,
people I could trust to stay when I was honest.
Those brave ones became homes for me.

I wish my imagination glistened
as it used to

I long for the rush of enthusiasm
with dreamy violins and brassy horns
of Tchaikovsky and Mahler

Where has the music gone
the tingly feeling in my chest
the excitement
now replaced by numbness
and in the midst of silence
shrill electric strains between my ears

Your love for me despite the nicks and flaws
lifts me from the pits and the claws of darkness
heaves me over hurtles to the fledgling light

The cards of the 30 year old deck
festooned with Monet´ prints
swoosh so easily pliant in our hands
we unthinking about what the cards must know.

The dealer endures rebuke for bad hands
and pleads randomness and no malice
but still has the cheek to brag of her own good lot.
The cards bear unholy smudges of anger
and oh the tales fingerprints could tell:
loss of cool, onslaught of quiet ire
if not murderous fancies
all shielded by superb acting
and control
of ****** muscles
and the pace of breathing.

This drama plays out
unspoken but with latently lurking
hurts, slights, envy
and long smoldering resentments.

Even patriarchy rears its ugly self-righteous head
and cords of tolerance of the old man are strained
and taut to the breaking point,
Pete now realizing why Kit no longer plays when Dad’s at table.

But then there is the rare event
like when it’s revealed that Liz had the better hand
but folded because she knew Burt needed a win tonight.

Our family room has a vaulted ceiling.
Facing each other in that place,
our eyes meet and in this gaze
across the room
we take flight
through hot afternoons
into cold dark nights.

What we reveal in this air
is the stuff of dreams and things
of joy, pain and sorrow washed in tears,
and when the clouds have cleared
there we are in a sacred space
in the wind and tide
where a mystic spirit
arrives and abides
for quiet moments,
and on this holy canvas we spread
the blush of eternity.

We bring memories of our dances
and missteps where we fell
into each other’s arms and laughed
at the folly of two fools
who leapt across their rifts and fears
across dry days and long years,
sank into the hearts
of each other
and flew to vaulted horizons
where together we reached
to touch the face of God.

Thinking of my closest relationships
makes me marvel at what a fool I am.
A map of the streams of my loves
would show small settlements
tiny villages where I’ve rested
from my frantic search for meaning -
spaces made by nights of talking and sharing -
spaces of kisses, cries,
shouts and whispers that kept together
the threads we coiled into a chord
of memories.

Memories of foolish leaps we both made
into a friendship, a kinship, a marriage
a co-creation.

What faith abides in me that causes
me to abandon logic for love?
It is a mystery to me
how I can stay in this embrace
despite our divergencies?

But it is a splendid mystery
I celebrate.