I.

Are we so very different, you and I?

Set apart, as opposites engendered,

shall we be made afraid of what may lie

within each other’s souls, and then surrender?

The sun and moon are separate, yet they dance

and share the sky in spite of grounded fears,

and even they, by choice or circumstance,

can have their shaded union in the spheres.

But I am not a rock in outer space,

and you are not a flaming ball of air;

we are two people, and there is a place

inside my heart, if you would travel there.

We are ourselves, and so there is a choice—

to moan alone, or join hands and rejoice.


II.

If we should join, and dare to dance and dream,

what of the changes and their crippling cost?

Will we have smiles, or will we only seem

to smile? What parts of us will we have lost?

A pair of flowers folded in a field

drinks in the rousing sun and soothing rain,

and, though their stems are shaped by scars unhealed,

they do not lose—they only grow and gain.

So, if I am the cloud, and you the light,

we must tend to these buds, and take great care

to douse determination with delight

and singe surfeit and whimsy with despair.

We must not force, but grow in unity;

let them take root, and shine on them with me.


III.

If we should tend a garden, let it bloom

with lively love, will it be overgrown?

Will all its roots entangle and consume

us into talk of ownership and owned?

Two folded flowers flourish into trees

under a sky of tender rain and sun;

their trunks and branches intertwine with ease,

so intimate that they are almost one.

Yet, it is clear—they are not one, but two.

As close as they are, they do not possess

each other; still, they keep so close and true,

supporting with their strong and kind caress.

Do not fear ownership from me, my friend;

my arms are branches, and for you they bend.


-x2A