Comfort Food

Don’t waste words
talking to me of love—
the menu full of too many options
and sauces I will never put into my mouth or body,
too much for me to remember
no matter how many times
you try to convince me
of these out of season specialties.

Today, take me to the garden
fresh with sunlight and the dew of the magical darkness
of the black moonless sky and her sister stars.
That is where I will run my hands
just above the warming earth
through tender leaves of lettuce
and the newly sprouting tendrils
of peas, beans, and feathery carrot tops.

There is no denial in this green place
where we feel the planet waking after her long sleep
under our feet as we walk side by side.
The life force moves up and stirs the appetite,
beyond hungry with this waiting
for the blossoms,
the budding fully in view
like the crown of the child
waiting for her birth.

Bring me the comfort food
of endless kisses and gazing into my eyes
as if there is nothing else you’d rather do
until it is time to caress the nape of my neck with your lips
and hold my hand to your heart.

There are no words
where this justice flows
between us and out of us
to where every other heart waits
or this kind of enlightenment.

We open the door
to the lusciousness of steaming pots
full of the saltiness
that unleashes
these simple pleasures—
fills us with nothing
other than home.

Hour Glass

What is this life
but that of the sand
released willingly,
over and over again,
gravity having her way
with each grain
until nothingness is filled,
bottom to top,
with the spaces that will become
nothing again?

Waiting for your love is like this release
of the dunes of a lifetime--
shifting with anticipation,
the shimmering mirage of the Oasis.

I put one breath
in front of the other.

In the heat under these sandals
my feet burn crossing the waves
of suffering and longing,
desire for the moisture of cool waters
at the edge of this desert,
wanting my thirst to be quenched
by the patience of the journey.

My lips will drink you in.
This throat will be restored by the ultimate
compassion of this love you have given.

The truth of this passage,
from one full life into nothingness,
is that I trust myself here
in our gentle exchange,
the knowledge of one thousand lovers,
the ease with which I take you in,
to bathe myself in the ambrosia of your face,
the patterns of your skin.

I plunge my hands deep
into the granules of sand
and watch you slip into emptiness,
only to catch the glassy grains
of your body in my other hand,
waiting greedily to hold you
just as full as her sister
hovering above, unable to hold anything—
never permanent,
always changing
and turning like the hour glass
marking the time
of endless love.