Three To Five Lines Of Love

I’m just a little ahead of the curve on the upcoming odes to Eros, Cupid, and Saint Val, but one might say my small poetic offerings aren’t much of an ode to hearts, arrows, & small flying angels anyway. What can I say, it was a mood – I ran with it…

Morbidity Loves

Swore indifference
then he covered his body
in my poetry

RL

Haiku
Street art photo, Toronto, ON by Randall Willis

Locks Of  Love

Coddled
your dark ego
before she ran away
said what she needed for a clean
escape

RL

Cinquain
Street art photo, Toronto, ON by Randall Willis

Imperilled Rescues

Broken promises to hate me
Spent his national holiday
Looking for me, sipping on dreams
to coax me home, to coax me home

RL

Tetra
Street art photo, Toronto, ON by Randall Willis

Cupid’s Fraudballs – Deep Love Times 1,001

So, not every love story resembles the Harlequin Romance model or the Dr. Phil / Oprah recommendations of ‘healthy’, nor are they as far off the chain as the trailer park trashy gymnastics  of the Jerry Springer couplings either.

Sometimes they’re the stuff of mythical proportions. Heady. Messy. Legendary – Taylor and Burton, Bacall and Bogart, Hepburn and Tracy – all grown from impossible drama seeds planted within the largest of human persona.

They’re the masters of the double black diamond slopes of emotional mountain ranges – INTENSE and tender, RAGING and nurturing, DANGEROUS and comforting …. Mythical Gods come to life, breathtaking to behold, and dizzily staggering to live with.

Not all are destined for fame or the full theatre; some of these lesser-sized immortals are merely just around the cul-de-sac circles, seemingly average neighbours, but just as fiery, and we knew two of them…


K&P Style
He will say she was unforgiving,
She will say he was unbearably untrustworthy.
He will say she is relentless wariness,
And she will say he mercilessly pushes her over limits.
He will say she is insanely focused on rules,
She will say his demands are cruel humiliations.
He will say she refuses to understand him,
She will say, seeking true empathy from him is like talking to the dead.
He will say she is every appalling name in the book,
And she will say, she loathes that he is only either angel or demon.
He seeks her adoring maternal nurturing,
She begs him to stand tall as a real & loyal hero.
She will say he burned down their home,
He will say she lit the match.
He will admit how awful he is,
She will concede that she aches for his good days.
He will say, he despises needing her this much,
She will say, she hates that she will never love another as deeply.
He will trim his beard for her,
She will grow her hair long for him.
He will kiss her neck,
She will take his hand in hers.
He will hold her face,
She will lean her head on his back.
He can be calmed only by living with the ordinary, the banal,
She can be safe only within strength without edges.
Their light has been, will be, entwined for eternity,
They will say goodbye,  1,001 times… or more.

…………………………………………………………………

Marianne Williamson said: “Until we have seen someone’s darkness, we don’t really know who they are. Until we have forgiven someone’s darkness, we don’t really know what love is.”

I’d add forgiveness does not mean having to keep anyone in your life. It means getting to your own genuine peace after exiting the dark.

Happy Love Day, to all.  Here’s to the  ups and downs and twists in life, regardless of the degrees, that steer us to our strengths, and hopefully, to our best love.

RL  

No Surrender

I am very honored to have this post featured on The Poetry Daily, February 15, 2016

Ever Been Properly in Love?

There was a talk show on CNN some time ago, in which the host always asked his guests, “Have you ever been properly in love”?  Of course that always got his guests wondering or reminiscing, and so, I did too.  Forgive me a few moments of sentimentality. It is Valentine’s season after all.

Valentines-Wallpaper- whiteI realize as I’ve got older that I have been properly in love many, many times.  Hey, keep calm and read on, it wasn’t all hormones.  I don’t mean just in the romantic sense that Piers was inquiring about, but with all the wonderful friends that I have known over the years. They may have come and gone, or come and stayed, but I am forever changed by the genuine love grown between us.

It’s the kind of love that inspired countless shared hours of deep laughs, light fun, brilliant thinking and inspiring ideas, and so many fabulous occasions. It is the kind that offers a solid place to lean on while navigating troubles and sorrows.

It’s the kindness of love that draws us to each other maybe for only moments in shared interests and similar stories, or for a quick friendly review of talent or taste.  Of course it has also taken my hand and flipped me flat out on the threshold of deep resonating romance, and then even permanently tied me to the indescribable heart-song of my child.

Love is a song made of infinite notes; it’s a never-ending tune that rises and fades like all dynamics of life.  There are no real endings because even after we’ve moved on, we left the trail of what we gave.

And so,  after all of this, yes, I would get to answer that question, yes. I have been properly in love, many times, maybe always. And, actually, isn’t that really the truth of us all?

Happy Love Day!

RL