Here we are at a crossroads
Separated by clouds of silence
We've exchanged laughs, stories, and condolences
You carried your virtues on your back
And I held my shortcomings in my hands
The horizon calls out your name
Waking the moon that sleeps in your eyes
Your light has guided us through the midnight grey
And this trail winds down to a story's end
Fireflies guide you home toward the moonlit sea
Where thoughts and prayers take the shape of water
And boats built from your benevolence
Take you to rest with the roots of your dreams
As I accompany the fog through woven forests
I echo your humming in this silent night
Building the distance that was written to be
I walk, lost in reflection, toward an unknown


And quietly,
my soul follows you home

You tore me apart
brick by brick
I came to realize that
you built a solid wall between us.

I am half a world away,
With a broken heart
Time travelling through the days,
Crying for the normality
That set us on this path in the first place.

In the past,
You tell me of your plans,
For the day I’ve already lived through
And I ache
To live it over again by your side..

How do I pull myself out
Of this mess I’m in?
Counting down the days
To the future when we share
The same timeline,
And even though
That horizon is the closest it’s been
It feels like a million lifetimes away.

How did we do this before?
Distance tearing me apart
Alone in the future,
Staring at white wall
That cannot be home
Until you share them with me.

I have loved you for so many years,
It’s all I really know,
The only way I can breathe,
Is focusing in the journey to bring you
Here with me.

I need to be brave now.
More so than I have ever been,
And my dear I am trying.
But it’s so hard to move forward
When I want to keep looking back
And wait for you.

But forward I’ll walk
Making the preparations I can
So when you fly through time
You reach the future worth travelling for.

In the past, right now and the future too
One constant remains true,
I have, I will, i do,
I love you.
***

They think Absence is a cruel mistress
A gorgon with brass talons who rends our bonds
And eats our hearts
Dousing flames
and snuffing out all the candles we lit together

But she is a gentle gardener
Sowing seeds of strength with calloused, work-toughened hands
Watering desire with the dew of distance
Counting day after day until the fruit of reunion is
Ripe and sweet and tender.

People ask me why I do it.
How do I manage being here
When my Love is
1,446 miles away
Thirteen states away
One time zone away.

"How do you do it?"
"I could never do a long distance relationship." They say.
"I would never be able to handle it."

Well, the truth is
The way I can handle it
The way that helps me to "cope"
Is purely the fact
That my relationship is not
a Long Distance Relationship at all.

In this Love miles may be tangible
but they are everything but definable.
We had Love before there was a distance
and that distance will never be used to
Define us.

No matter how many miles there may be
I can still feel her Spirit with me.
Her laugh rings in my ears when I can barely muster a chuckle
Her fingers gently touch my skin when I drift off away at night
I can hear the gentle yawn of her voice when I get up saying,
"Good morning."
I can feel her singing along with me in the car to our Song when my voice cracks.

Our relationship is not a Long Distance Relationship.
Just because there is distance
does not mean that distance defines It.
She isn't absent until I come home
or when he visits me
My Love is always here.
She may be in whispers, and small chuckles, and light sighs
But a part of her is always here
Always with me
Always there
and I can feel it.

So in a sense
our Long Distance Relationship
has no distance at all.
Because creating distance means to separate or to bring apart
And that's not what our relationship does in the slightest.
If anything
these 1,446 miles bring us closer
Closer than we could ever imagine.

I'm not saying that I enjoy
not being able to physically see her everyday.
But this chapter in our Love is not hard or difficult or too much to handle
And it certainly isn't bringing us apart.
Because we both do not see any other option
This is worth it.
This is right.
This is It.
This is the kind of "It" that everyone talks about
we all hope for "It", search for "It", even die for "It."
and we are so blessed to have found It so early.

So these 1,446 miles will not be permanent
but they are so indescribably worth it.

colored handprints alight
splattered in dots and lines
a glassy pillow stretches
its wrinkled and hairlined skin
     cracked
           creaking
   crooked
          
               stretched wearing thin..

a hold on the waves
grasping currents
            passing
   rushing farther and farther

painting the vastness
of this open ended question
muddled muddied marred
      blurring in sight

lately, it seems when you call you speak you mind,
motion to hang up before i can even consider mine.
do i exist simply as a gateway for you to speak?

my lover leaves me lonely,
my best friend soon to be alone on a plane
back home to me; tape him up in bubblewrap
beg him never to leave

so much time is spent in this room
isolated enough to warrant yellow paper
still, the textured white walls seem sentimental
they do not feel as big as the bed

it is so lonely without you, darling
but even when you are here,
it remains so empty
i reach for you in the night.

try as i may, even when you linger
you are so far, my darling,
too far to reach; too far to hold.

and i find you only see me once i turn away.
is it my eyes that alarm you, so full of emotion?
or do you want me just close enough for warmth,
but not close enough to listen to?

the broken furniture holds your motion,
still are the shadows that hold your shape,
and i cling to the pillow that isn't quite your length
but it will let me hold it; it will let me love

i picture you in the shower,
borrowing shampoo, speaking of coconut cream
and my dreams are only tinted memories
are you leaving me in the chill of the air conditioning?

perhaps i'll never know until you finally close the door;
the season has only just begun, my darling
there are so many half hours still to yearn for you;
i'll be quiet and laugh at your commentary until the credits roll

i'll quietly await the sudden goodbye.