Poised on the Brink of a Poem

Poised on the brink of a poem, my love

Somehow your touch on my thought

Stirs me to reach past the ache of farewell

Back to a place memory-wrought

What is the color of loneliness, love

Is it the shade of a breeze

Rising and falling, a phantom baton

Strumming the night-ridden seas

Is it the whisper of what-once-had-been

Rousing both wonder and want

Tipping a scale bent with laughter and grief

Painting thought’s walls with its taunt

How is it that ink curlicues can compose

Harmonies sweet and surreal

Cupping the echo of living’s adieus

Where only thought-touch can feel

Masterpiece moments re-shaped into word

Never do justice and yet

Somehow a memory secured in a poem

Helps me to never forget

Someday I'll take the piece still in my clasp

Though now the music of home

Seems quite ordinary, I know I exist

Poised on the brink of a poem

© Janet Martin