seven years of love songs

i have burned every love note,
every desperate scribbling on a bar napkin,
on a Post-It note,
letters written and labored over for three days' time,
drawings and comic books that tell of love between me and

oh, pick any lover,
for just as
whose lips these lips have kissed
and when and where and why
has been my (romantic) (swan)song

i have known only the thrill of the falling
and have come around to the deep seed of love
unfolding softly
as an ex girlfriend
as an ex "love of my life"
and never as
one who said yes to the ring

so i have many, many friends
whom i know SO well
and who come to my aid in times of deep trial
and who safely and wisely counsel me
on my own folly
and vice versa,
for we know each other SO well
in the safety of no future possibility
and no fear of loss of the love from the other
for we have already lost
and now can throw our hands up in laughter and
be here to help each other

men, lovely men,
with whom I have experienced seemingly karmic levels
of forgiveness and redemption

and with whom
i shall make never home nor child.

and the wind blows,
and the pages of the calendar flip
and a secret child is born and dies
and a career is rewarded and then denied
and the throngs of ignorant revelers
join a madness they never created,
only agreed to on accident...

and inside this bubble of insanity
an entire world of true love reverberates
inwardly and outwardly
every cell of every being

calling you, it is calling you as it is calling me
as it is calling every soul,

drop this lie
drop this madness.
now.

i, myself, am awakening to the unconsciousness of my own
hell pain rendering

so what a surprise this morning to find, tucked inside an old text book,
between the Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock
and
Sweeney Among the Nightingales

the last remaining love letter

a note i somehow never burned in ritual
(full of pomp and drama, i have
renounced my mistakes in romance
for the sake of finding a true love
never noticing the tender slowness
of partnership)

my first love,
secret, forbidden,
an obstacle built by age and position
and family relation
full of poetry and pain
that continued
an un bel di
for seven years.

now we are seven years past.
i do not love him and he does not love me.
i wish to have a partner, not a father, not a teacher.
he is long married to another.
and yet
as if it were the echo of some ancient dream
rounding the corner of this mountain
my heart aches to discover
his plain song to me,
a love song for me,
one written after seven years of trying
and failing

when my ship comes in...
my ship has come in, again and again.
i have always run to another shore too soon
to enjoy the unloading of the ship
i have just lighted to shore.


ah, ego. i temper myself
and enjoy the agony of love lost.

"Erin (I am in her so much"
by M

(Hope it's okay I put it here, my love,
and I am not sorrowful at our parting,
I am grateful for out meeting. By the way
I love this poem you wrote)

"I am in her so much,
that the tender brine
of the tears left behind
still pull
as she slides out form under me, forever.

I am in her so much,
that the slender spine
of the crimes rot behind
still ill
as she slides out from under me, forever.

I am in her so much,
that the slander sign
of the hopes shot behind
still shrill
as she slides out from under me, forever.

I am in her so much,
that the candor rhyme
of the love said behind
still thrill
as she slides out from under me, forever.

I am in her so much,
that the decanter wine
of the truth sipped behind
still will
as she slides out from under me, forever.

I am in her so much,
that the torture blind
of a world so unkind
still kills
as she slides out from under me, forever.

I am in her so much,
that a joyous time
of a world still divine
will shine
if she slides into me, forever.

...

Illness roaring in
settle over our fine dreams.
A crippled, dull fog mystifies me.
But you,
you,
you are a reminder
that God has not disappeared-
You are a reminder of Beauty in this world.

..."



the rest is too personal
even for me
to share
and already I am probably making M
mad at sharing his personal letter to me
here
on the other hand he may like it
if he reads it he will let me know

but

I like that poem
a lot.
I wish i had not burned all the rest but
they say
what every poem, every war, every tango, every ant says on the inside of its words
the seed of intention is
love
even inside fear
there is a deep love
drop down
drop in
find that word
and all the world becomes a lovesong.