As We Forget

You should know one thing.

When I look at the opal moon,
or at the red march of autumn
past my window, -
when I am near the fire
and watch a glowing crumbling body
of a log become soft white wood ash –

I think of everything that links me to you,
for everything that exists, we have shared
and carried with us as we set sail toward
our shared intended destination.

But things did not spin out as we intended.

Little by little you stop loving me
and I stopped loving you in the same
way and manner. Then suddenly
you forgot me – no longer looked at me
or for me – we had become strangers,
and already I had forgotten you.

If you feared that to break our long détente
might make us mad, that the winds of change
will tear down the banners that we had flown
as we passed on our way through life:
we could decide to leave each other
on the shore where once our love took root,
and heartsease blossomed from the sand and clay.

I remember that on that day,
at that hour, we lifted our arms
and found them, transformed to wings
and so flew off to seek another land.

But as each day, each hour, drifted
by, the sense that you were destined for me
began to die, and then each day one flower
died and fell from the vine of love, and no words
climbed up to your lips to seek me,
sorrow became love’s wage and food.

My love, your love, ceased, and
in us all that fire of passion became
extinguished, and forgotten: my love
fed on your love, then we were both
beloved, but our arms are wings
no longer and we have ceased to fly.

Rick Storey