For my heart there is no sturdy bulwark
To guard it from the candor of your sigh
Mingling with the essence of the blue dark
Ghostly profusion dripping from the sky
Caught in the throat of midnight’s moody breeze
The elements of love and longing sweep
For naught can thwart the flow of memories
They rise and fall like billows of the deep
As yesterday adapts the muted robe
Of centuries that form the stricken dust
The milkweed flings its silk across the globe
Heedless of where its candid seed is thrust
But we, the author of our private woes
Can never its full secrecy disclose
***
Wrapped in the velvet pleasure of your smile
Is all the goodness of this world I ask
It warms me when another’s lips are vile
And lifts the mundane shadow from my task
Should worry taunt me with its formless fear
Or paint its dread upon my gleaming eye
Its blighted ruse is naught but tarnished cheer
It cannot quell the rushing of your sigh
I touch your lips that brush against my cheek
Miles cannot cool their warmth breathing within
I trace the tender curve of words you speak
And seal their kiss in vaults beneath my skin
For we, the keeper of love’s sweet caress
Choose to conceal its sacred tenderness
***
Life paints upon the canvas of our souls
Its intimate and panoramic art
Where none can know the murmur that consoles
Or runs translucent fingers through our heart
And no one else can see the artists brush
Or feel the splash of shadow, dark and light
What tone consumes the dim October hush
Or mingles with the teardrops of the night
Who leaves the imprint of delight within our sigh?
Or tears the lining from our hidden deep
Who lights the spark of passion in our eye
Or knows what we applaud or why we weep?
But we, the lone spectator of the whole
Can see life's pictures painted on our soul
J~
