on comfort

Last night I curled in my skin
Around you
And felt the long miles of memory
Stretched out behind us,
The bright ribboned highway of our passionate youth. 

Your breath was soft,
Dressed like the universe,
And splendored into a thousand stars,
The galaxies of your dreaming in rhythm with God.  

Each fiber of flesh,
Soft in the lull of sleep,
echoed faint with the catching of our vision-- 
The quiet smooth miracle of belonging.

--Teri.

all i never did

September gave way to a winter far more bitter than I ever imagined it would be, tinged only by a small sweetness in knowing that a tiny autumn seed I planted may have germinated in some way.

I wrote back in September that I needed to find a way around the roadblock of my tongue, a cowardice lingering around my heart, almost impossible to overcome. I needed to tell my uncle, my childhood hero, how I loved him, and admired him, and was inspired by him. I wrote that I needed to do this, before all I couldn't tell him, became all I never did.

In this moment, I'm sitting at the deathbed of that same man, ticking off the hours as he loosens the grip on his body and prepares to cross the threshold into the Infinite. He's dying in front of me, 6 feet away from me, and all I couldn't say to him is becoming all I never did--right now, in this room.

I asked him to read my post about him when it was written, and today I'm praying that he did, that he somehow understood my love for him, and that he carries that knowledge in his heart as he readies for his departure.

Love has no expiration date, though opportunity often does.

--Teri.