Just think for a moment what it must take for a person to wake up every morning to the same smiling face they’ve loved for 25 years, only to remember for the 8th time this week that ever since the dementia, what was once a love on fire had become a daily exercise in re-acquaintance and discovery of love lost.

This is a person of fortitude.
Their love abounding; heart secured.

We aught to honor this person.

we are slow dancing.

music calls out softly from above,
but i barely notice,
entranced by the moment.
we swing together with ease,
two halves of a greater mind.
i’m so glad to have restored
this peace.

but then you step on my toe.

the music swells.
suddenly my fists are beating on your chest.
they pound on and on but do no damage.
with each strike your resolve only builds.
the space between our bodies nears inferno.
now the room burns red.
ash rains down in glowing heaps,
charring my skin but missing you altogether.
chaos has found my sanctuary.
i cry out to you:
make it stop!
just let me be!

but the flames still boil with hostility.
i look into your eyes,
searching for the humanity
behind that steely gaze.
but there is none to find.
i struggle to keep dancing,
to keep thinking, caring, breathing!
i forget how to love!

then there is quiet.
the fire dies,
the music slows.

we are slow dancing.

You are the wind
beneath my feet
lifting me from the ground
just high enough to taste
exhilaration

You fill up my heart
right when it’s about to choke
on the fumes
that have sustained it
for too long

You are not absolute
You make no promises
But you breathe potential
from every mouth of your
existence

Raise me up from
the depths of this darkness
I know you are the wind
beneath my feet
You have proven that

So lift me higher

(let’s go said he
but where said she)
just far said he
how far said she

away said he
(okay said she
but how said he
just now said she)

(this place said he
i know said she
with love said he
our love said she)

this dance said he
(deep trance said she
my bride said he
my guide said she)

(it’s time said he
but why said she)
must leave said he
can’t breathe said she

i wish said he
you’ll miss said she
i care said he
(not fair said she)

tell me why i hear your voice on the wind
and glimpse your eyes among the lily flowers
tell me why everytime i think of you
i stay thinking and thinking for hours

tell me how to sleep with you on my mind
and forget those nights with just us two
tell me how to keep my hands from shaking
every **** time i come and talk to you

tell me if you ever want to be friends
and of course never wait to do so
tell me how i’m supposed to be happy
when you know these things i don’t know

There is a boy in my past who went to bed
and learned to play with the fairies of his dreams.
He came to know there was always an escape,
but never seemed to need one.
“Go off and play with the fairies,”
his mother told him,
“they miss you.”

There is a boy in my past who woke up
with fairies beating their wings
against the insides of his conscience,
leaving soft marks on his mind.
There has never since been a feeling
so transcendent.

There is a boy in my past who went to bed
and lay awake, remembering the feeling of magic.
More and more, he was unable to find that place,
but never stopped trying.

That boy no longer understands
what it means to escape this colorless reality.
He does not understand the sweet taste
of freedom or the rush of passion.

Those fairies meant more to him
than just cheap, dreamy thrills.
They were the embodiment of all good things
and the teachers of all human emotion.
It was from them that the boy learned
to perceive life with a colored perspective
instead of the monochrome expectation.
It was from them that he realized
his own personal definition
of a meaningful existence.

There is a boy in my present
who longs for how things used to be.
His mother no longer allows him
to visit with the fairies.
Sometimes he wishes
that she would.