More than I've cared to admit

 

 

It so turned out that love wasn’t a uniform rainbow
arched the same thickness over lands and oceans.
That was hard enough, but even harder to let go
the stereotypes of rigid, unbending notions.
It was difficult to find its ultra-violet edges,
the infra-red loving, all that’s invisible.
No smooth spectrum here, disjointed waves and ridges
and way out of earshot, just one whispered decibel.

 

It turned out that love wasn’t a rushing river
trilling down the mountainside with its chant
of what goes on, or doesn’t go on, forever.
It chose to dry up sometimes, nonchalant.
It was a shock at first, but more of a surprise
that even dehydrated it can hum a tune.
that it sings somehow, even though it dries,
or suddenly stops into a lake or lagoon.

 

II.

 

I’ve loved you more than I’ve cared to admit
too much loving is also a character flaw.
It’s all about moving and rapid transit
to love one world and then quickly withdraw,
little to do with ultra-violet and infra-red
banded into one single width of a rainbow
and listening for songs in a dried-up riverbed
and waiting for stagnant lake-waters to flow.

 

And I have loved you more than I’d like to write
in careful poems counting out the syllables
on parchment pages held up against dispersed light
read low in whispers of uncertain decibels.
I have loved you in this arid desert dawn
and seen the entire possible serrated bandwidth
without a drop of moisture. And where the sun has shone
down on the dry river bed from its zenith.

An old, old one from ten years ago, when the blog was in its infancy! Floated up and felt right so reposting. Back here on Wednesday for WEP.