O Beloved

O Beloved, I’m going to speak to you now
as if we understood each other somehow;
as if the fire you wear as your crown
wasn’t my very own house burning down
O Beloved, I’ll speak as if you were Time,
and I was the tree you crawled like a vine;
waving both arms to ward off the crows,
Beloved, I don’t want to know all you know
Beloved, our bedclothes are roiled by the tide
that drags us below and then up to the side––
buckled and winded, enthrall of the deep,
Beloved, don’t make a promise you don’t plan to keep…
Beloved, I see faces in cupboards and walls,
knocking like horses awake in their stalls;
their eyes rolling back, electric and wide,
Beloved, I was only just finding my stride
Beloved, December has turned into May,
and all of our years come down to today––
Beloved, Your world is much stranger than we
had ever imagined each other to be…
Beloved, we’ve left very little unsaid,
and nothing unsung here over the dead––
whose vanishing rise enlivens the blue,
O Beloved, I hide from and
I’m running to you