We are not done

We Are Not Done

We are not done. We are
ongoing conversation,
sometime monologue, sometime soliloquy.
Done is undone in our transforming reality,
our we that is, and will be.
As perplexing as speech sometimes seems,
I will wrap my errant tongue unceasingly
around the shape of this dialect we long for
yet hesitantly speak. Years down the road
we’ll continue our halting imperfect communion
because we have chosen this holy union.

No. We are not done.
Done is baked bread filling the air
with aromas of childhood, golden crust, served up,
butter and jam, eaten, gone, done.
Done is my hair, washed, cut, coloured, and styled.
Done is your fishing trip into the wild.
Done is each finished task, our completed to do lists,
but done is not done when we both choose us.
Yes we will disagree for a time,
but when emotions
and the need to be right mellow and calm
we’ll be right back here; take my hand, carry on.

Because we are not done
striving, surviving, staying alive, relational jiving.
We are not done doing and undoing
all we’ve messed up, gluing what’s come unglued.
We don’t live the
“you complete me” sentiment.
We chose, our promise remains.
We are not done. Always, we begin again.

One day, I imagine
you will hear my breath reach
between the words I cannot speak,
nearly there, almost, there.
In that pregnant space you will hear
the language of your heart, beloved.

My heart will be the echo.

Come, come again

When the sun is book-ended by cloud
and the kitchen lights are lit by 3,
when long-term plans are
no longer relevant after darkness falls,
when the evening hours outlast your novel,
and tones tint deeper than a glass of red can reach,
pour a bath, light a candle, soak
and say goodnight,
and sleep.

When sons are gone,
and daughters pending plans mean life apart,
when the stranger in your bed is you,
and friends are snowbirds, and birds
of a different feather,
and you cannot remember a particular song
that once called your soul awake,
pour a bath, light a candle, soak
and say goodnight,
and sleep.

When laughter is a needle skip on vinyl,
and joy is what you try to do,
when last week’s inspired thought is vaguely passive,
when mice leave their evidence on the stove,
and the dog paces, paces, with relentless sighs,
and you don’t know what to do, to do,
pour a bath, light a candle, soak
and say good night,
and sleep.

Sleep. Sleep. Sleep.

And Spring, like a shock of hair falling lush
across the pale face of winter,
will come and wake you,
melt ice tears from your silent waiting eyes,
and kiss your forehead warm lipped like a lover,
and you will rise, dance barefoot
in the garden on smoldering grasses,
yes, you will dance again in golden dusk light come,
come again, yes, come.