1975-05-05 5 May 75 … the conversation

                    5 May 75 ... the conversation

   Last night she talked to me and expressed more than I knew she held
     vessel of my love...
   Like night and day, I walk in and out of her influence
     and I'm torn by the winds of our love and thoughts,
       and she, for her love, bears as much.
   Until we know, we won't be free of this waiting
     and until we part or mend, we'll be torn of heart.
   Deal my mind cries... wait, my heart screams...
     hurry, my fears whisper... Rose my love says, ... Rose.
   She said maybe we'd never be happy,
     she said maybe the big hurt would be better
       than this waiting and a future filled with more hurts.
   And then she held me until not the winds of hell could touch me
     and whispered to me to do the best I could.
   She said if she could just know that I was coming back
     she could cope with anything... and I tried.
       I tried to make it work, to say it without cheating...
         but, I couldn't.
   There's no way to say for sure if you don't know
     unless you cheat or lie... I wanted to put her on hold...
       wait for me, I thought, don't get lost until I know...
         but we both know who would lose more this way.
   So strange... when I'm away I can't think of anything else
     for the emptiness that fills me so threateningly
   I move in dreams which wait to wake...
     I drift in these dreams, unfelt... unseen, spaced
   a traveler in a silent scream...
     moving in poses... through washed out scenes.
   She says I want my cake and to eat it too.
     That, like some child, I imagine a paradise here
       lying hidden from me here in my mundane life.
   I want love without hassles and problems...
     she doesn't... she doesn't want or imagine more.
        Our love is more than enough to make life good
   Is it that we're afraid that since we've only loved once
     that it wouldn't happen again if we split?
   And, are we avoiding the answer, either way,
     with this touch and go love of ours?
   Am I improving myself with all of this...
     or just ruining a good marriage?
   Do I know the answers and my pride blocks my sight
     of do I know and it's just fear that stays my hand
        or do I just not know?
   Is the way of the intellect just too hard for me...
     or is my common sense saving me?
   Am I just a fool chasing whimsical ideas
     or am I a coward,
        afraid to live my best dreams out?
   What am I...that I can feel her love like warm hands all over me
     and her arms like all the mothers in the world
        and think there's still more?
   What am I...that I can see how our love holds me
     because of my emotional need for love's security
        and not walk away from this material bond?
   Who am I...that I should have to answer...
     and who am I that I cannot?

                                 gallagher
                                 5 may 75 North Long Beach
                                 - late at night at Rose's apt.

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

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