A SECRET MAP IS THE MEMORY

A secret map is the memory
so I remember daily 
How your empathy rides across the winds
Where the treetops dream of the divine.
My antlers illuminated 
where my thoughts
Rise at the sun's availed touch. 
We are part drops of water, kneeling
to the fish: 

Hummingbirds come to your window
And say, "We have captured the voice 
Of your Sweetheart's heartbeat
in an anthology written of you and him
from the hands of God." 

I was with you in Europe 
when your eyes traced towns with observant meaning. 
I was with you
when your heart lept at the glimpse of tiny worlds 
that made you wonder if only you 
were seeing them. 
I was with you 
when loneliness covered you as you waited 
and wondered when he'd return. 
I was with you 
when burning brands filled your swan's heart 
when the storms of heavy words chased you 
like assassins on the loose. 
I was with you 
as you dreamt of one 
that would run through the gates of your love, 
your swan's heart,
after preparing a feast for a king.

Madcap seismographic results, elastic
abstraction it may have been,
To all whom have been in the crosshairs,

But I waited 
in my own shadows, in the stew of stormy skies
collecting the ramparts, absolutely
weightless, blurred by all that is
imperishable. 

I waited for you
for all these years,
and now the field has leveled.

I wait for you even now 
as I sleep upon your heart
like the bee that sleeps 
in the pillowed arms of the rose.