Her face is like a poem
Her heart a willow tree
Bending softly in the moonglow
Beating always for me
She’s the bell in my distance
The hearth at home
With me everywhere
Even when I’m alone
In the desert she is water
She’s the forest and the trees
Everything she is to me
Everything

What breath he borrows from your question
That he might live between your punctuation
And Death, in its mercy, avert its gaze
A resurrective reprieve if only for as long as to say
He had a predilection for cold sores
For pushing harder than was required and giving more than was needed
When he appears to me, he shares a knowing glance
A promise of explanation to the sudden unanswerable absence
As he moves to speak, and share the elusive truth
I awake
I always wake

The rosebud wind tickles my nose
Or maybe it is my allergies
I have missed the touch of spring

The severed canyon split-snakes out beyond my view
Like a hazardous sidewalk God has yet to fix
It would be a nuisance to the strong strided
Or a beautiful scar to the like minded

The owl outside my window
Doesn’t hoot
He screams
Which sends me running
No, tiptoeing
Through dark rooms
Until
Into your doorframe
I lean

Father is snoring loudly
I shan’t wake him
Instead I silently
Crouch then crawl
To your side
Sweet mother

Your sleeping breath
I observe
Then my finger
Softly taps
Your slumbering arm
As you
Wake gently
To shield me
From harm

Your kind eyes open
And quietly
Slip out of bed
To lovingly take my hand
As we walk
Through dark places
Until
Resting my head
Upon the pillow
You hush the owl’s bellow

Curled up by my side
To cradle and comfort
Panic retreats as
You usher in
Peaceful sleeps

This selfless act
Is repeated
For years

Through every dark room
You guided me
And erased my fear
I see this now
And eternally
Feel you near

If you consider a woman less pure because you've touched her,
Maybe you should take a look at your hands.