~and for Harlan, who loved this one best~

"for tandem is the ever-changing, graying color of their fierce attached tenacity"

waking/walking in
careful pacing regular lock steps,
like new cadets, counting cadence,
in perfect silent, almost motionless,
except for the minuscule quivering of
slightly parted moving lips

these two elders,
still now plebes,
freshmen
but of a latter, graduated stage,
demonstrating robustly
the slow shuffle-along,
a well practiced dance conjured
'in tandem'

her arm, crooked in his,
his other hand,
in protective custody of a
knight's armored chain glove
encasing hers,
he, shuffling just,  
a precise, intended half-a-beat slower
lest she ever think
that she, ever be a drag upon him

hair, his,
threaded with daily,
new arriving grays,
proudly accepted
as the privilege of
graceful aging

hers,
disguised with periodic outings,
outings for the hidings of life's bookmarks,
conceding nothing ever to
time's lunatic desire to separate them

modest in dress,
styling hints of  pasts' elegant,
the man's hat defiant,
daringly jaunty angled,
a small scarf to handbag knotted,
matching his Windsor knotted tie

the passers-by, all smile,  
the signal charm of an
end game processional,
thinking so sweet,
yet mine eyes detect more,
something
hardy and radical

a fierce, fierce fierceness,
both fighters in the resistance,
armed with tandem tenacity,
ground given,
but only inches surrendered,
wounds resisted by
scar skin toughened
by the caress of ions bonding
under the pressure
of atomic level mutuality

worn out,
well past Purple Hearts,
no capitulation feared,
to the ever changing,
enemies' new disguises,
they,
a two person platoon,
each,
having the other's back

and I burst into tears on the street,
a train of out loud moans,
even groans emitted,
like a string of perfect pearls
breaking,
clattering on an asphalt terrain

weeping
not
from visions of the inevitable,
sighing
not
from the certitude of a
cycle's uptime ending

but jealous furious by this reminder delightful,
angry at myself, for having lost so many wasted years,
mine, the loss greatest, for absent was the
fierce tenacity of tandem

~


~==~
compassion
is   a   towering
tree,       its      roots
grow   deep,    for    that
space to  reach,  in  between
a    rock    and    hard  place.   to
find    its    nourishment    from   pain;
it’s     sustenance      in     life’s       pouring
rain.  for  its  seeds  lie  in  needs;   the  human
kind  of  suffering.  without  which  this  gift
would­  cease  to  exist.  a  grace  of  great
price;   a   pearl   of   bright   light.
well   - nurtured  it  spreads
it's  broad  arms,  to
swallow.   the
s o r r o w,
to  comfort
a   mother,
a   father,
a  son  or
a daughter,
to     give
hope    to
the  dark  of
their   night.
an ointment it brings
not just once or twice, but a
salve to soothe a breaking heart... for life!

~

*post script.

please, for one moment consider this... the human emotion of compassion does not, and cannot, exist without suffering!  compassion is in many ways like a mirror image of pain, and a man or woman with a well-developed gift of compassion knows it's great value is in its ability to enlarge our capacity for selflessness, for in sharing compassion we absorb another’s pain.  yet we must also remember that many kinds of pain are incurable and are destined to be borne for a lifetime.  therefore, equally important to that thought is this... compassion is not a “one-and-done” cure.  instead it is an ointment and salve that must be applied, as often as needed, even for a lifetime to those who we love.  and is not this the greatest pain reducer possible?  ( and what’s more, it also does serious damage to narcissism! imagine that... two for one! :). it is only then in this context that i say these words, "pain is the gift that awakens our compassion!"