(poem) 1

1 March 2022

But what is love?—

(the broken spigot

the crackèd cup)

Love is the feeling of being up,

Of always moving about your mind

Thoughts of your beloved; all of the time.

Love is the feeling in your chest

Of sickness and encroaching death,

The feeling to try again—no matter the price.

The feeling coming to you at rest.

Love is the image in your mind—

(the broken-record matinee

the beautiful and the everyday)

But what is love?—

A singing bird,

Whose song is seldom heard,

But whose melody may replay

Every moment of every day.

Love is cruel, and rarely kind,

But you can’t escape its reaching grip,

From shore to shore on every ship.

Love blows the wind, and shakes the sea,

Love always brings you back to me.

But what is love?—

Can I see it in a screen?

Can I see it in a picture frame?

Does it come with fortune... fame?

Does it come with laughter or pain?

Can it be caught or seen?

Oh! But what is love?—I ask one last time!

Love is the hands on the clock to now unwind.

Love is the Creature in the Pit, whose hunger is immeasurable.

Love is the hatred that molds us kind.

Love is often viewed as pleasurable,

but Love is not our gracious friend!

Love betrays us all in the end!

Love is a fiend who steals our sleep!

Love arrives unexpectedly, stays a week without paying rent!

No, no, no, that is not Love at all.

Love is a beautiful fall;

The fall of Autumn leaves gathered in the yard,

echoing words of the eternal Bard,

the final actor honored in the casting call.

For the play-of-life would be dull without Love.

Life would be quite dull… without Love.