Sunday, November 13, 2022

poem

 Middle Position

The meaning of the loving perspective

comes often near middle age 

the middle way between

loathing and adoration

hopefulness and resignation 

between the force and the quivering 

the believing and the finally living 


here everything radiates outward

away from the Eliotian still point

illuminating both past and future

here there is no light


delineating any difference between you or me

from this point

everything is seen

neither clearly nor cloudy


from here on out

old as you are

you’ll never be any younger


what arises is a gratitude

for the missing father the lost love

 the never said words the thwarted passion

whose very absence 

codifies the importance

of presence like a hot iron branding 


after the cooling, what emerges

is the wisdom of knowing

in a man who sees the spaces

carved from invisible stone

that only he could ever see

Love is presence in absence 

one demands the other 

love breathes into existence

the space that only love itself can fill


It isn’t the middle

it isn't the halfway point

neither beginning nor end 

it isn’t anything 

it isn’t nothing 

let’s just say—

Everything all at once 


11/12/22

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