LOSS

Sure of my life and your death,
I walk slowly towards
the acceptance of loss.
Slightly disoriented but never lost,
I have come far
from somewhere in the beginning,
but never fully anticipate arrival
while I continue to nostalgically walk back
to what left me behind.

Immersed in motion
in an effort to avoid
the bottomless reality that my house is
no longer a home.

I am a tireless traveller
on a quest
to find a worthy passageway
for your ashes and your restless soul.
Tied by destiny
to the quietness of blossoms,
you sleep, one with the earth,
in the most beautiful gardens in the world.

My personal journey may be unconventional,
but is no more unique
than the wandering of others
who are unable to avoid
the unavoidable shadow of loss
and the absence of love.
Unable to deny
the undeniable reality
of living in a world
of hours without hours,
we are all vulnerable to heartbreak.

Although hurt and pain are universal,
the intensity is likely proportionate
to the quality of the joy of love lost.
The priceless value
of the irrecoverable treasures
that sculpt the space between worlds.

I tug at memories
of a boy with his mother
and a man with his father;
of invisible landscapes
of friends long past gone;
of animals that were pets
and pets that were like children;
and children in hospital gowns
that left the party
long before the music played.

Life, like names, can fade,
as do the petrified faces
in the black and white photographs
hanging on the wall.
But dreams are in crystalline color;
reflections of my world,
gifts from my life
and my lifetime of gifts.

In my universe,
the greatest of all gifts is you.
Happiness is you, as is love
and where music lives.
You are moon
in a forest of stars.

Wedded soul to soul
my love,
you live in the garden within me.

It is a priviledge
to breathe the same air.

© JOHN PISCATELLA