I did not think then
I had the right to answer in full
nor to speak the truth that it is not
what I want that I have come to fulfill

So I answered only in part—
but the better part and the highest truth
of what it is I really, really want:
acknowledgement of the truth
that you are and I am
and only freedom runs
between us,
only love
is real.

So I said I only wished to be 
your friend, to make it palatable
I suppose, to not shatter your world
of pretty illusions and pretense. I thought
I would speak truth but in the tiniest sliver
and not yet confront you with this sword
I am to pull from the heart turned to stone.

I wonder often, had I deigned to speak it plain
in all its glory which way it would have gone.
Would I have been dead as they later said?
Or would you have seen in my eyes
what I have always seen in yours
and would that truth have set you free
from all the bondage with this situation
or that through the years that have passed?

I settled by suggesting it was only peace, only
kindness, only friendship. But you, it seems,
on your way to the Sunday social to make
yet another appearance, were content
to make your proclamation of denial
of what I thought so small a thing
by saying I was not permitted to have it
and then reinforcing it with all that would
come after and still all these years gone by.
Even this morning, I suppose.

Heaven knows, as does my heart,
where it will end and how it did start.
But I did not know then, my true friend,
the cost and the consequence of all things
out of time and misaligned with natural flow
for me and for you. For you, all things you
refuse to receive or believe and the bloody
battlefields you walk away from. For me,
all things I accept and give or abandon
and how I stand knee-deep in pain that is
a quicksand and lose my place in time.

Still, there is a certain quality of light
and a faint heartbeat of remembrance.
And there is love. You can run from it
and all the bloody battlefields forever. 
I can pick it up and examine it, trying
in vain to dismember it. You can
keep up appearances. I can forfeit
everything. You can deny vociferously.
I can affirm repetitively. All of it 
can have us running in circles
forever and ever but the Lord 
of the Harvest comes close
as this new agrarian society
emerges out of thin air
and the echo of his
voice becomes 
a wave.

Could we not change this time,
along with the course of his story
and hers? Could we not meet
on some new field, green not red?
Could we not, after holding the line
of contrast for eons, move into patterns
of potential from which might emanate some
better gift, a legacy of love in its highest form
for this world in which we have wandered
ever in search of our selves?

What I want does matter.
This is the truth I've learned.
So, while you know by now who
and what I came to be, perhaps 
it is time to speak it plain. And in my name.
I am Dawn and I am your friend who
belongs no more to the bloody battlefield.
I am Dawn and I will not be defined
by a story that is not mine—no matter
how many thousands or millions you
line up in a line. I am Dawn and I 
dance upon the wind. I enter in
to life and fear not death nor
all the deep shadow cast 
upon me. I am made
in God's image.
not yours.

And, to the point
of what I want, it is to share this life
that runs so lovely a river between us
and for this gift of life I bring to be seen
for what it is and not made to be
its opposite. And as for you,
I desire the same: that you 
should know your name
and the full meaning of it.
And for us: a time, a place,
perhaps; but most of all
what I did say, once upon a time...
open flow, honesty and
all things lifted up,
set free.

Maybe a conversation
could be the place to start,
face to face, heart to heart.