Contentment has a different kind of sound
To everyone who has ever witnessed it.
It fills the heart and settles the mind
And baffles those who have dismissed it.
Those canting people that cackled at us
Scowling, “Give up, it’ll never work.”
We smiled and continued our courtship
Not thinkng them a bunch of jerks.

We carried on, celebrating our successes
And learning from our many mistakes
And in time we began to see quite well
This is just what love and life takes.
We made our plans and changed them
When things didn’t go the right way.
And step by step, and inch by inch
We became who we are today.

Now we have sounds we make to each other
Less words, more loving noises we utter,
Salutations cobbled together over the years
Some remolded nicknames we often mutter
Glad we have walls around, roof above, and
Sounds made upon our leaving or returning,
And all is well here in our home of love
A message that the home fire is still burning.

A visitor might ask us, and have before
What did he say, or maybe, what did you?
I could explain the habits of our years
But no need. I heard and of course, I knew.
We often use the telescope of contentment
And look backward to where the sounds began
To watch them change through time and space
And become what they became over the span.