January 2023

 

by  Jack D. Harvey

In spring you touched me

like a newfound flower,

kissed me with your rose-red mouth,

caressed me with your hands;

you said wait till summer,

write it down, write it down.

Now the river grows hot

and slows under the sun,

the path

along its bank clear and bare

as a swept palace corridor;

the sky above

immense blue dome

ominous, empty of life.

The grey mallard floats alone

under the wooden bridge,

forever fixed in place,

a Chinese painting;

nature rises in disgust against it,

its stillness, its careful art;

do we care that captured

now is really now?

When the time is right,

cut the two of us open,

see our hearts,

supposed lovers,

surprise the living flowing world

that so long we waited

in the same place,

withdrawn and empty,

still as the willows along the path,

still as the stones.

Our fire has gone out,

the days long past,

but this time together

will never end;

lost in our own bower

we need no faith in the morrow,

no newfound continents looming;

just the two of us

in one embrace,

static, eternal,

like an unbroken ring,

like a distant star's

unperceived swing

around the heavens;

only here, only now,

in one moment abiding,

under the light of our own sun

love's fulfillment is complete.