A trek to the golden peak,
of clarity of every kind,
she had taken up earnestly
as her singular mission all along.
Near  the  upper reaches,
at the difficult terrain,
without any admonition,
an avalanche.
Her ego, frozen and hardened,
rushed towards her,
blocked further progress,
for ever,
like a wall of resistance.
She tried her best
to venture forward,
but she had lost the path
completely by then
and didn't know which way to turn.

You gave me the child
that seamed my belly
& stitched up my life.

You gave me: one book of love poems,
five years of peace
& two of pain.

You gave me darkness, light, laughter
& the certain knowledge
that we someday die.

You gave me seven years
during which the cells of my body
died & were reborn.

Now we have died
into the limbo of lost loves,
that wreckage of memories
tarnishing with time,
that litany of losses
which grows longer with the years,
as more of our friends
descend underground
& the list of our loved dead
outstrips the list of the living.

Knowing as we do
our certain doom,
knowing as we do
the rarity of the gifts we gave
& received,
can we redeem
our love from the limbo,
dust it off like a fine sea trunk
found in an attic
& now more valuable
for its age & rarity
than a shining new one?

Probably not.
This page is spattered
with tears that streak the words
lose, losses, limbo.

I stand on a ledge in hell
still howling for our love