Our limitations -
Our mortality,
Makes this existence;

YOU.
ME.

40 years of holding hands -
A lifetime spent with you;

This love we have together -

Worth living.

Nicholas.

In the middle of my thoughts
You arrived in blaze and found
The remnant of my drunken, bleeding heart.

You were relentless
In pursuit of re-existence
From ashes and fragmented hopes

That exhausted afternoon
At scorching 4 o’clock
In the corner of the room

On the creases and the pillows
We shed our clothes
And re-assembled eternity.

A journey not calculated by distance or time, but by memories -
Our story unfolding between those layers,
Like small puzzle fragments coloring a portrait,
Revealing their purpose -
Presenting its complicated story.

We are but silhouettes reflected upon the sand in the moonlight -
Dancing and howling at the moon,
Asking for the stars...
To keep,
To hold,
Just long enough for another one of those moments -
Even if it is the length of a breath,
I could find eternity in you.

O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done,
The ship has weathered every rack, the prize we sought is won,
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring;
But O heart! heart! heart!
O the bleeding drops of red,
Where on the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.

O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;
Rise up—for you the flag is flung—for you the bugle trills,
For you bouquets and ribboned wreaths—for you the shores a-crowding,
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;
Here Captain! dear father!
This arm beneath your head!
It is some dream that on the deck,
You’ve fallen cold and dead.

My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still;
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will;
The ship is anchored safe and sound, its voyage closed and done;
From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won;
Exult O shores, and ring O bells!
But I, with mournful tread,
Walk the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.