ODYSSEY OF LOVE

As Infant

IT was simple

Touch

Smell

Taste

See and hear

Soft was soft

Smiles were smiles

Kisses were kisses

As Child

IT was…different

Am I cared for?

Am I really liked?

Am I loved…really?

As Adolescent

IT was…Hell

If I do this well, will I be--?

Why did they invent mirrors, anyway?

Why don’t I love even myself?

Will I ever find IT?

As adult

IT was…a disaster

I knew what IT was

Why didn’t they?

I knew what  IT needed

Why couldn’t I find more?

I learned IT was all misread

Why didn’t others?

As a Being

I’m listening to petals open

I’m seeing noise made quiet

I’m smelling transcendent breezes

I’m tasting fragrances awakened

I’m touching the infant within

What if IT just is

Sans definition

For it own sake?

Consider the…

Who and what of love

In a world where marriage convention

affords little emotional purchase

and commitment outside the institution weighs heavy

on the traditional

Panicked love brokers of halo driven missteps

mount their marbled pedestals of self-deceit

and preach their continuum for tried and proven failure

to those of vacuous preference

Who might they be

these carnivorous angels of imagination

these habitual slight-of-hand love merchants

in three-piece suits

and vestments of supernatural protection

whose power of persuasion beckons you buy

into the promised sacred memories of tomorrow?

What mutation of species thrives on the suffocation of will

who bless the innocent to sacred prisons of the flesh

where long-term pain of born-again ignorance

is sanctified in the form of perpetual lineage?

And who are those who reject such iconoclastic relics of yesterday

and seek rather the oft-missed nature of love

that which proffers life’s partners as born of fragrances

from bouquets of unpollinated flowers

visions of untrammeled dreams

and the concertos of atonal memory

tethered to a cloudless ether of joy and innocence?

We ponder and ask…

Is there a romance of life

a ripple of peace and rest

as storms fade behind us

and nature's wash cleanses the residual wounds of the past?

Does the blue of calm meet the red of passion with cautious beckoning?

Are we but delusional in our praise of the heart's ceaseless trumpeting of yesterday's echoes?

And what of this creature comfort that oft times is mistaken for love

can it be that mind over matter is reality's checkmate for careless games of infatuation

where the romance of love proves to be only dreams mistaken for consciousness

bringing aloneness begging of forgiveness?

For truth be told

romance is life

a lyrical perspective

allowing the music of winged intonations and soulful protocols

to harmonize with the fragrance of smiles that permeates the symphony of living

where the clouds release sunlight

storms arrest our complacency

and cascades of past emotions take their rightful place

in the now of yesterday

the present of today

and the magic of tomorrow

What is romance

if not all of nature

all of the imagination

and forever the rapture of love

in all its wanting

in all its impatience

in all its unknowns

and forever in all its undiscovered self-perpetuating enigma

but oh how sweet its reality

For the tenacious few

There is…

The dissonant romantic

Who knows of imagination without reference

Of flow without reason

Of instinct beyond logic

She is the Dissonant Romantic

Whose vision is colored by the reflection of white light from time remembered time

Who remains invisible to those who fail to

See the valued juxtaposition of rose petals atop the compost

Feel the caress of a Chinchilla's curiosity

Hear the high C of a Bay-Breasted Warbler

Amidst the thunderous clouds of disappointment

Even as searing emotion tries to bury her

Vibrations somehow reach the inner ear

And coalesce with memories untouched

She is the Dissonant Romantic

Who awakens in others the blossom of a seed unknown

A consciousness that transcends all doubt

A personal truth that shocks then cradles the weary

She is the Dissonant Romantic

The ageless sage we all hunger for

The one committed to creativity without

Judgment

Compromise

Or price

She is the Dissonant Romantic

Forever available to some

Known to few

Envied by many

Perhaps the universal answer is to…

Love...Each Day

To gather love's petals of laughter

its dewdrops of sadness

its rays of being is to be

somewhere love needs to be...Each Day

But for love to turn the corner of life

without looking both ways

is to leave behind the wisdom of flowers in bloom

about to become the re-cycling of life

the clouds of insecurity

not yet aware of their purpose

that awaken your every morning

and your learned caution that guides love to

be where it needs to be...Each Day

Oh to be that cycle

the cycle that mystery sometimes shrouds with mist

to give drink to the rose beneath the cover

to know, to feel, the sound and sight of discovery

to be aware each time it affords the chance

to approach the unknown valleys beyond the corner

for that somewhere love needs to be... Each Day

Love remains poised for the beginning of light's assent

that will become days

becoming life's time capsule of patience

awaiting where it must avail itself

So while serving the winds of time

let not our sometime ill choices

go without your water and soil

to prepare the inevitable thorns

that will guide us to full potential

For although blooming comes often

one's petals unfold only until such weight makes weary

the moment's sustainment of joy

the moment's perpetual rapture

the tenuous moment of love awaiting

the next somewhere it needs to be...Each Day