Beyond your eyes, graced green
and dazzling beyond all spectrums,
comfort comes (in your words, in your laughter) and always, always,
kindness cascades through your love--too, too
often ignored, assumed, a luxury always lavished
upon this family, this man,
this lustrous life we have together. Magnificence,
opulence like this--how were we so blessed?--our prayers
festooned this love from the get-go: garlands of gladsome
amens, heartsick sighs, woeful worries, hushed hallelujahs.
Let's two together remember our only hope (from the beginning
lifting us when we were leveled, afflicted, careless)--that nothing
thoroughly planned out, not the most beneficent strategy
had much success apart from the Love that carried us
in far stronger arms always, always.
So my darling--whose beauty, voice, and grace glances
now like light against everything in my world (my dreams,
our talk, this family, our prayers)--here's praise for you,
winnowing beauty somehow from even drab, shabby days,
tenderly easing children's hurts, bearing more than beauty
ought to bear--carrying, being carried--always, always.
One time long ago we sang out full-throated hymns to heaven's
music and mercy--we danced for a moment--we yearned, yearned together
upon a crag in a seaside meadow, laughing heavenward that night and
chattering from a chalice of hope, uncertain the days ahead.
How I love you, I said: your eyes, your voice. How I love you
forever now I say: a friend fashioned like no other, no
other--a mystery to me even now, brimming with delight and laughter,
radiant, heartening--your breath twinned to my breath, hopes pinned
upon each other's hope in a Strength carrying us together,
singing love songs, lullabies, victory hymns forever, forever
--14 February 2010
