You come from a
garden, I think.
When you stand still
like that – long arms draped,
splay-fingered hands flat,
and electric hair – you
could almost be a dryad.
I, on the other hand,
am told I look good
in Benedictine black,
sackcloth raven
running to God.
You’ll outlast me:
old loves like
old habits
persist.
We cannot help
the fond feeling,
warm as a carpet
square of stained
glass sunlight,
when the last
of each peculiar
passion has long
since spilled.
Thirteen round
red rose blooms
sag, dusty and
discolored –
like skin ten decades old
that will paper our
origami faces.
Beside your picture window,
you’ll still drink the world,
wish thin snow into
a blizzard as magic
as the ones when
you were young.
And when the lights
go finally out, when
earth sinks to dark,
when fires fail –
and when a lifetime’s
worth of kindnesses
dry up and disappear,
you’ll like the quiet
well enough.
To have loved a perpetual optimist
I am one and I know I drive my cynical friends out of their minds with my cheeriness, it has and will always keep me warm when there is no fire…this is a somber yet beautiful piece.
A cheery optimism, if it is natural and unforced, is good. It encourages the cynics around you – even if they complain about it.
Forced optimism, on the other hand, is just grating. I think it is the dishonesty – there’s something about not experiencing the actual moment that seems off. (I don’t mean here things like looking on the bright side, or acknowledging blessing, but trying to control one’s thoughts and force oneself to feel what one doesn’t.
Thanks for the kind comments.