If you should hurt me,
I’ll give you a smile and then
turn the other cheek.
If you trouble me again,
I’ll explain once more
and pray you learned your lesson.
Should you wrong me thrice,
I will break your shallow pride
and hound all your descendants.
Warm is the home
whose tables bear marks
from cold glasses.
Cold is the home
whose furniture lacks
any laugh lines.
Go away.
Do not approach me,
do not talk to me,
don’t even look at me.
It’s enough
to have watched you fall
but I’ll not face you
ignorant of your sins.
Why do you never remark on
how much I flub and flounder
when you queue such querulous quips in moments
where only a few minutes of mindfulness
would ease the ache attached to one’s soul
which strains itself with such graspings that one
can barely breathe while deigning to deliver
what answers one is able to arrive upon.
Oh, how that creaseless smile
strums my heartstrings
and tugs at my memory.
I reach out to touch that joy,
and revel in remembrance
of golden days gone by.
The sight of your smile
throws me into the heavens
to drift amid stars
whose radiance pales before
your bright prominence
which joyously draws my eyes
back to my beloved’s Earth.
My gaze discerns the nature
of beauty lying within
a deceptive container.
My hands are shaking
yet still act with courage
to draw forth the hidden.
My throaty whispered words
breathe a meaningful truth
which animates newborn figures.
I stand alone amid the green
and give voices to the failing trees.
Enthroned at the heart of the world,
my land ripples out beyond me.
I am lord of the leaves,
king of the canopy,
and yield my divinity to none.
A (wise) man of two faces 