DO NOT LOVE ME YET
Do not love me yet, for I
Am still a slender moon,
A scimitar about the heart
Too sharp to touch too soon.
Before I’m touched I need to grow
More full in golden light;
I need to smile upon my earth
And rule some patch of night.
I need to know what roads and fields
Lie in my domain
And dull my brand new ecstasies
With sophomoric pain.
I need the love of some blank boy
As cold and dark as me,
That we might grope in ignorance
And fear of what might be.
And then, when I’m a silver bowl
And know what I can hold,
Then, then, perhaps, we could try love
If you are not too old.
WHAT’S THE MATTER?
Do you want me? What’s the matter?
You’re afraid some door will close?
You want the scent without the rose?
The moans of love without the chatter?
You think our love might be a tomb,
The only exit through my pain?
You’d rather put things off again
To give your fantasies some room?
You think: she’s great, but in a while
I might get bored? Or something better,
Filling out a tighter sweater,
Might flash me a quick come-on smile?
You don’t want to be tied just yet
To just one future, just one kiss?
You think about all you might miss
And hold out for a better bet?
Well, fine! But then why do you haunt
Me like a jackal night and day?
Why, when my interest seems to stray,
Are you so sure of what you want?
8 NICHOLAS GORDON
Why, when I dare so much as laugh
At some guy’s jokes, you go ballistic,
Nasty, borderline sadistic,
As if somebody touched your stuff?
And yet when I hook on to you,
You will not let yourself be mine,
Take out your fears and draw a line
Between what you and I can do?
But freedom must be mutual,
And it takes two for one embrace.
You can’t both love and freedom chase,
Unless you would adore a fool.
EVEN THOUGH WE FIGHT
A LOT, I LOVE YOU
Even though we fight a lot, I love you.
We fight, I think, because the stakes are high.
I sometimes get so mad I cannot stand you,
But underneath my anger I could cry.
I have an uncontrolled need to control you,
To be your only destiny and guide.
I know it isn’t fair to try to mold you,
But my poor love’s entangled in my pride.
Ah, love! Please love me even in my fury,
Which rises like a tide beneath the moon.
I plead before my only judge and jury:
I want to change, but know change won’t come soon.
Love finds it hard to let the loved one be
The person who is loved so passionately.
EVERYTHING I’VE DONE, I’VE DONE
Everything I’ve done, I’ve done
Only for your love.
Everything I am, I am
In hopes your heart will move.
I know that you love someone else,
But while you’re away,
I’ll love you just as though our love
Would last till you are grey.
Till you and I are grey, my love,
And all our days are done,
I’ll love you just as I do now;
Your heart’s my only home.
FATE IS OFT THE FILAMENT
OF PASSION
Fate is oft the filament of passion,
Illumined by the force of its fierce flow.
For love, far more than chance, may fortunes fashion,
The unwilled will that wills the world we know.
Years break, yet love maintains the tides below.
Of love, fate is the most precise expression,
Nor could one find a more complete confession,
Even as good tidings come and go.
EACH TRUTH IS JUST A SCRIM
ACROSS THE DARKNESS
Each truth is just a scrim across the darkness.
We cannot see what most we’d like to know.
We drive among sheer cliffs in pale moonlight
Unsure of where we are or where to go.
When we allow our heads to make our choices,
We lose because of what we cannot see.
When we give way and let desire take us,
We lose because we want what cannot be.
We inch along the dream-lit rocky ridges
Knowing always, always we must lose.
The end for all is darkness everlasting,
And so it matters less which road we choose.
What matters is the beauty of sheer being;
The gifts we have and those we will become;
The ecstasy of loving so completely
That we ourselves are more than minds can plumb.
Love well and know that love must end in pain.
Be a fool and pay the unmarked price.
Be generous of self, and passion gain:
One who never loses, loses twice.
DREAMS DO COME TRUE
Dreams do come true, but only when
They make it through despair,
Limping into everyday
Transformed beyond repair.
No dream would be a dream if it
Could pass for something real,
Nor would we sail for paradise
Would it its shoals conceal.
So it is with love: the dream
Long longed for, now possessed,
Must be a dream no longer, but
An emperor undressed.
Stark naked it must come to us
In unaccustomed shame,
And we must take it in our arms
And love it all the same.
And we must love love as it is
That dreams might still come true,
Mangled into miracles
To make our lives anew.
HE CARES ONLY
THAT I’M HAPPY
He cares only that I’m happy,
Even were I not with him.
If some seek on the wind love’s traces,
Some seek out the love within.
All my pleasures are his treasures,
Nor does he crave joy alone.
All have claim on his compassion;
No dark soul is on its own.
Giving thus, so naturally,
Each day he lights the love in me,
Like candles on a sunlit stone.
HOLD ME TO YOUR
WILLING HEART
Hold me to your willing heart
And let me—help me—weep
That I of need might fall apart
And then at last might sleep.
Let the truth slice into me
That I might finally bleed
And purge myself of agony
I cannot now concede.
For I have bound myself in light
That I might live in joy,
And cannot—will not—let the night
My bonds of love destroy.
And yet I know if I would gain
The peace for which I pray,
I must allow the floods of pain
To wash my love away.
HOW CAN I KNOW SO
SURELY THAT I’LL LOVE YOU
How can I know so surely that I’ll love you
No matter what the future has in store?
Time is like a cave in which our torches
Show only the circumference of our minds.
But love is will far more than it is passion,
Though passion may at first sustain the will.
One chooses love the way one chooses faith
Because that is the way that heaven lies.
My love for you is vaster than the ocean,
More rich in loveliness than coral seas.
I would no more relinquish it than let go
Willingly the precious gift of life.
I AM AFRAID TO LOVE,
AND YET I LOVE YOU
I am afraid to love, and yet I love you.
My fear is like a wall I walk right through.
The wall is there, and yet it doesn’t stop me.
I need it still, and yet I still need you.
I know someday we will be in a field
Surrounded by the blessing of the sky.
I’ll dance with all the freedom of pure joy,
Needing you without a reason why.
But now I’m still afraid that I might lose you,
That you might not accept my desperate need.
You make me laugh and cry and be completely.
You are the flower, I the slender reed.
I DIDN’T GET A CHANCE TO
SAY I LOVE YOU
SAY I LOVE YOU
I didn’t get a chance to say I love you.
You were gone before we got that far.
All I know is now I really need you,
Yet when I look for you, you aren’t there.
You said once that you never would forget me,
Yet how am I to know without you here?
Such emptiness! Like what I feel within me:
Neither flesh nor tears, just cold thin air.
Sometimes, alone, I feel your arms around me,
And all my need for you spills out in pain.
Jagged memories of you surround me.
I cannot think I won’t see you again.
I FEEL AS THOUGH MY
HEART LAY BLEEDING
On a countertop.
The pain is like a flooded scream
That cannot, will not stop.
I cannot live, I cannot breathe;
Pain is all I do.
I cannot think how I can be
Long living without you.
Ah, God! I want you back so bad
That I would gladly die
To hold you in my arms again
And not care how or why;
To hold you in my arms again
And tell you of my love,
And then go gladly back to dust
Should I your heart not move.
I FIND MY HAPPINESS
IN LOVING YOU
I find my happiness in loving you.
Though my love is not returned, I don’t mind waiting.
The woods are a cathedral where I pray
For the beauty and grace that lie within my heart.
You hold me and we kiss, and yet not yet
Is there the unity that love must crave.
You want me, but not as I want you;
This truth is like a wreckage on my sea.
There’s no one else I hunger for, nor touch
That makes me feel I must take off my skin;
And so I’ll wait as years pile up like leaves,
And long with the lonely patience of the moon.
I LOOK AT YOU AND THINK:
I CANNOT LIVE
I look at you and think: I cannot live
Without you; you’re the person of my dreams.
Of course I know I can, but I must give
My heart room to tell it as it seems.
Romance must have a language fit for feeling
More than fits between the earth and sky.
For love there cannot be a floor or ceiling:
My love goes down too deep and flies too high.
So when I say I cannot live without you,
Know I can’t imagine so much pain;
And when I claim to always dream about you,
Well, know the moon is happy once again.
The sun reveals cold truths for all to see,
But I must light my love with poetry.
I LOVE YOU AS A VALLEY LOVES
I love you as a valley loves
The river through its fields,
Or as a note upon a page
The music that it yields.
I need you as the moon requires
The sun to make it shine,
Or as a soul in search of faith
Is rescued by some sign.
You are as much a part of me
As meadows are of Earth,
Or as a song is of a heart,
Replenishing its worth.
I love you as a hawk loves air,
Or a sailor loves the sea,
Or as a strong wave seeks the sand,
But ah! do you love me?
I LOVE YOU EVEN
THOUGH I KNOW
I love you even though I know
You show no love for me.
Your eyes are icy springs that feed
My hidden ecstasy.
All night I hold you in my arms
And sleep in your embrace.
All day I turn away from life
To gaze upon your face.
Alone I find within my heart
A black and raging sea,
For only you, beloved one,
Can calm my Galilee.
I LOVE YOU WITH ALL I AM
I love you with all I am
And all I’ll ever be.
You are my moon, my sun and stars,
My earth, my sky, my sea.
My love for you goes down and down
Beneath both life and death,
So deep it must remain when I
Have drawn my last faint breath.
Holding you for months and years
Will make Time disappear,
Will make your lips my lips, your face
My face, your tear my tear;
Will make us one strange personage
All intertwined with bliss,
Not man or woman, live or dead—
Just nothing—but a kiss!
I USED TO BE COMPLETELY
CRUEL AND HEARTLESS
I used to be completely cruel and heartless,
Using girls, then tossing them aside.
I used to feel an angry, bitter hunger,
Not knowing why, nor looking much inside.
I used to think the goal of life was pleasure:
My own, of course, whatever that might take.
A woman’s feelings had to be her problem.
Self-sacrifice was always a mistake.
And so, with just the slightest twinge of conscience,
I hunted for my lonely ecstasy;
And even when I wanted a companion,
The only one I cared about was me.
We make our worlds, like God, in our own image:
Mine was a metropolis of stone
In which all souls were either fools or cynics,
Doomed to take their pleasure on their own.
And then I fell in love with you, and somehow
Your happiness meant more to me than mine.
The desert became green and lush with flowers,
And like a sun my heart began to shine.
And like a wind I swept across the ocean,
And like a star exploded into night,
And like a song I held love in my hands,
And like an angel knew that this was right.
All that I had thought was proven wrong,
All the lies to justify my greed.
To love was to embrace the pith of life,
To feel a joy far stronger than a need.
And if I could so love, I could be loved,
Could think someone might want me and believe it,
Could let another know me without shame,
Could give my self and know I could retrieve it.
All this I tell you that I might be known,
That all of me no longer be alone;
And if you do not love the one I am,
So be it. I will weep, but understand.
I WANT TO MAKE YOUR
HEART BEAT JUST FOR ME
I want to make your heart beat just for me.
I want a true love in my lonely life.
I’ve looked a long time, dated many men,
But none I walked with walked in step with me.
We walk together well, the best of friends.
Somehow we just fit, as if clean cut
To go together, zigzags complementary.
But now I would be something more than friends.
I know I take a chance to mention love.
I’ve no idea what feeling’s in your heart.
But if you’d catch a burning, plunging star,
I know I’d make you happy for your love.
I’M SORRY FOR THE WAY
I SAY I LOVE YOU
I’m sorry for the way I say I love you.
I know this kind of talk is far too soon.
I cannot stop myself; I just adore you.
And so this truth pronounces its own doom.
But when a truth betrays itself, I wonder:
Could it be that such a truth be true?
Or could the sweet compulsion that I’m under
Be caused in part by ignorance of you?
I know only the truth of what I feel,
Which lies beneath all sanity or rule.
My love for you is deep and rich and real,
Though it may be I simply am a fool.
Time will tell the truth, for if you do
Not want my love, I cannot long love you.
LET ME LOVE YOU WELL,
IF NOT TOO LONG
Let me love you well, if not too long,
For passion is a lover of fresh air,
Relishing the landscape that is there,
Belonging to what must to all belong.
Let me make you part of my sweet song,
As I will be of yours, that both more fair
May part, enriched by what we share,
More seized by life, more gentle, and more strong.
For passion is a gift one should not squander:
For fear of loss, losing life’s best joy,
The ecstasy that we were meant to feel.
And if it comes and goes, then we must wander,
Enjoying what we’re given to enjoy,
Reveling in what our loves reveal.
LOSE YOURSELF IN
LUST, MY LOVE
Lose yourself in lust, my love;
Enjoy me as a thing.
Make my flesh your fantasy;
My soul, your sycophant.
I would you would with me, my love,
Let all your voices sing,
Losing not one ecstasy
That some sweet sin might grant.
For love loves not that secret space
Where dreams turn into wounds,
Festering for lack of care,
Untended but by stealth.
Love enjoys a secret grace,
Calliope of tunes
Inexhaustible, for there,
In trust, lies love’s true wealth.
LOVE COMES TO
THOSE WHO LOVE
Love comes to those who love, who find their joy
In others’ joy, their tears in others’ tears.
Those in need receive the gifts that buoy
Them through the misspent yearnings of their years.
Weakness is a strength, and power none,
For none has power to compel affection.
Passion to the self-consumed may come,
But love looks for the grace of its reflection.
Love is like a tide that comes and goes,
And comes and goes according to the moon,
Giving and receiving as it flows
Between high headlands weathered and rough-hewn.
For love becomes itself the cause of love,
A double-knot not easy to remove.
LOVE IS NEVER EASY
Love is never easy, but
It turns life into song.
There is no bit of circumstance
That love cannot transform.
There is no weary moment
Of anger or despair
That love cannot convert to grace
And render whole and fair.
How passionate the paradise
That comes from knowing well
That someone in your happiness
Finds pleasure for himself.
How sweet the gift of giving to
Someone who gives to you,
A selflessness that gives to self
More self than self is due.
With all the searing madness of
The world from day to day,
And all the dreary sadness that
No joy can take away,
There is one truth more beautiful
Than anyone can bear:
That two can trust that when they turn
They’ll find the other there.
LOVE LINGERS
IN THE ALLEYWAYS
Love lingers in the alleyways
And wafts across the streets,
And knocks upon my double doors
But never does come in.
Love finds a home in entranceways
And rattles round retreats,
And scurries past the faint applause
Just two doors down from sin.
Ah! Would I love would I but know
What love might have in store!
For I have fears of heavy chains
That jangle in my joy.
And I have fears of floods that flow
From asking life for more.
Silent, I prefer the gains
Such tempests would destroy.