As usual, I'm a couple weeks late in getting 'caught up' on reading my favorite blogs, and find that Beck has posted another great reflection spiced with questions and followed up with many good comments, on the longing realities of living in a mixed orientation marriage. That is, despite all the love, blessings and good intent, there is still part of us hungering for connections that probably just won't happen. It's simply because we've made and continue to make personal choices and commitments to maintain our family relationships, the benefits of which we believe outweigh the obvious alternative of persuing relationships via our more natural orientation. Such discipline doesn't stop the longing, but perhaps it does teach us about what is really important.So, for what it's worth, I'll post my latest poem, which I've been working on for several months.
On the Topic of Wishing
During a sunny winter day in February,
That I was outside, doing something else,
Like walking the beach, hiking through woods,
Or rooting around in a flower garden sky
Of bright Zinnias, which remind one that
There is only so much life yet to enjoy
Until you slowly fade away and die.
Yes, I’m slowly growing tired and broken.
And today here I am, inside the closed box,
Ticking away at tasks, building critical mass
Of details probably important only to me.
Perhaps I should put the yellow pencil down,
Step away from this momentary diversion
Of writing a poem, and just drive to the sea.
Oh to wander the wet glistening sand, listen
To the pounding surf and savor the salty air
Filling my lungs, my soul, my quiet longing for
Touch and something I cannot quite describe,
And yet I feel the void, so easily distracted!
The setting sun enflames the wide vacant path
Along the foaming edge, driven with the tide.
Perhaps then, wishing is for dreamers who
Go nowhere, lost in their reality of minutia,
More consumed in maintenance than actually
Moving forward, not owning their time and place,
Whereas the new golden fronds of sword fern
Rise from rich earth and slowly uncurl into deep
Green spears of living flesh, and find their face.
I am told to wish for peace and joy. It works
For me, most of the time. And yet, it is slippery.
I watch it slither into the still and murky water
That decomposes the leaves and memories of guilt
Now dissolving as a rotting carcass of what I was
And recycling who I am becoming. Such living water
Shall fertilize my soul and deliver me from wilt.
