-- Love’s Full Knowing --

by John Herlihy

Love’s full knowing only comes with loss,

As winter’s full knowing comes with frost.

Presence of the lover offers brief certitude,

Days pass as scented wind filled with gratitude.

To know love will help a person to persevere,

To know the loved one held in the heart as dear.

Such love has not yet suffered the thrust of pain,

A poisonous spear that leaves behind an ugly stain.

Love’s full knowing blooms with the loved one gone,

The intimate whispers and sweet breath of love’s song.

We pride ourselves on the realities we think we know,

We humble ourselves on the realities we come to know.

Loving mother, brave father, intimate lover, faithful friend,

We think they live with us forever until the fateful end.

Then, what has happened, but we find ourselves alone,

Bones in harsh sunlight, the smoothing of a rough stone.

In the presence of the loved one, love still unknowing,

In the absence of the loved one, love’s full knowing.

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Copyright © John Herlihy

Sunday 16 June 2024