Love

All work is copyrighted by Steven V. Hight.

The Riddles of the Sphinx

What animal
walks on four legs
in the morning?

It is I,
crawling, disoriented,
from the cocooning comfort
of quilt, sheets, and mattress.

And on two legs
at midday?

It is I,
caneless and carefree,
braving the distance
from coffee counter
to tableside seat.

And on three wheels
in the evening?

It is I,
pedaling my trusty tricycle home
for a blessed reunion
with you
after another laborious laze
in Fruita.

April 24, 2007

I Fell in Love with You Again Today

I fell in love with you
again today:

when we awoke
with our hands already clasped
or still;

when you rolled over to say
Good Morning
and the sparks in your eyes
set mine afire;

as you emptied the kettle
over our tea bags,
a mundane task performed
with so much ritual and love;

when you scurried back under the covers,
fresh and glowing from the shower,
wrapped in your big purple bathrobe
to ward away the morning chill;

as you drove me around town
from errand to errand
without complaint
when I could not stop complaining;

as you marveled over the beauty
of the birdseye maple
used to craft
that antique dressing table;

when you found so much to enjoy
in the label
of an old, burlap bean sack;

when I went to bed early
to recover from the day
and you read in bed beside me,
draping one leg over mine
so we would not break the contact;

and as you rubbed my shoulders,
when I could not sleep,
to take away the pain
that plagued me,
so we could return to bed
together
to cuddle and clasp again.

I fell in love with you
again today,
as I did yesterday
and all our days before that,
and as I will tomorrow
and all our tomorrows to come.

April 22, 2007

We Climbed the Mountain Together

I could lie and say we did not feel the heat
       and the cold.
I could lie and say we did not gasp like fish
       on the dock.
I could lie and say we did not tire or thirst
       or feel pain.
I could lie and say we did not fall and crawl
       to the summit.
I could lie and say we did not love what we
       two did together.

March 28, 2007

The Days You Were Gone

The first day was like one hundred years,
       the day you left this town,
and went off to that foreign place
       so you would not let them down.

I ached inside that empty place,
       that hollow place deep inside,
and found no comfort in our bed
       without you by my side.

My dreams just will not let me rest,
and your absence makes each day a test.

The days are like one thousand years,
       and the nights are longer still —
I count the hours till you return,
       but I must wait until.

March 21, 2007

All My Nothings

All my nothings,
scrawled in shaky pen
and typed in elegant fonts —
all my nothings,
no matter how thoughtful,
no matter how beautiful —
all my nothings,
be they thoughts on a note card
or thousands of words on reams of paper —
all my nothings
fail,
and must always do,
to describe how I feel for you,
for all my nothings
cannot add up
to more than I can say.

March 15, 2007

You Are Nothing Like a Butterfly

You are nothing like a butterfly —
       your impact’s not so fleeting —
for if you only flutter by
       you set my heart to beating!

February 25, 2007

4:15 a.m, February 2nd , 2007

Five hours or more have just slipped away,
as if they never existed.
I gave them away, like they were mine,
like I did not borrow them
from the precious few hours
I have with you.

February 2, 2007

Autumn Splendor

It’s quite lovely out tonight,
isn’t it?
I ask you,
as we sip our tea
and read
on the front porch.
You look up for your book
and peer over your glasses
to smile,
and you reply,
Yes. It is.
It is lovely.
And you reach out with
your hand,
across the narrow chasm
between our chairs,
to clasp mine.

It’s quite lovely out tonight,
comfortably cool,
a night for light cardigans
and mugs of hot tea.
A cloudy, starless night,
that suspends the gentle fragrances
of recent rain on evergreens,
of smoke from a distant chimney,
and the first blush of mold and rot
on dampened leaves as yet unraked.
A night for crickets to serenade us
as they search for their last loves
before winter comes to claim them.
A night for gentle showers
that crackle and cleanse and carry
life
in their delicate, dancing drops.

It’s quite lovely out tonight,
a transcendent night,
a night of timeless scents and sounds
that connect me to the world
and a gentle, loving touch
that connects me to you.

October 5, 2006

Interlaced

Interlaced —
yours then mine
then yours then mine —
lightly held
or tightly squeezed —
yours then mine
then yours then mine —
a grasp, a clasp,
a bond unbroken —
yours then mine
then ours then ours.

September 1, 2006

Maybe

I’m feeling a bit bluesy.
Maybe it’s something I ate
or didn’t eat.
Maybe it’s something I did
or didn’t do.
Maybe it’s something I thought
or didn’t think.
Maybe I just need sleep.
Maybe,
when I hug you
and sleep through the night,
maybe, when I wake up,
maybe then
everything will just be better.
Maybe?
Definitely.

October 31, 2005

Security

I come to you, and you are naked,
stripped of all but who you are.
You kiss me softly, and you murmur,
your smile in the dark sends pains afar.
Your full breasts flood above your belly
and ease with comfort our turn to sleep.
We wind in each other like ivies entwining,
settled in embrace till death us keep.

May 6, 2002

Quintessence

The land springs forth
       from earth,

the sea springs forth
       from water,

the sky springs forth
       from air,

the sun springs forth
       from fire,

and all else springs forth
       from our love.

March 27, 2001

Comfort

There is no silence
between us,
only moments of quietude
born of comfort and caring and love.

Moments that lift, buoy, and suspend us,
moments that support, caress, and nurture us,
moments of contact to bridge any gulf,
moments for which we live.

2001

Massage

Your experienced, loving fingers
glide nimbly
through the scented oil
glistening over
the tautened cords
of my back,
untying the knots
and untangling the kinks
created by the maddening moments
when we must be
apart.

2000

The Beacon

The light of God emanates
from a billion billion eyes,
each casting its essence
into the inky darkness of night,
each unknowing, unblinking gaze
seen by all
but touching no one.

Your eyes radiate
more fiercely
than those billion billion suns
and cast your essence
into the inky darkness of my soul,
your searching, silent gaze
touching all there is of me.

Valentine’s Day, 1999

Just Sentence

I was thinking of you just now,
and it occurred to me
just how special you are to me,
and it was just like the first time
I had thought that thought,
and it reminded me
of how, every so often,
when I look at you just right
or kiss you just so,
it is just like the first time
you and I realized
we fit each other
just right.

1999

In the Glorious Ever-After

I no longer care
if there is an Afterlife.
If there is,
there is;
if there is not,
there is not.

Being with you,
right here,
right now,
is all the Heaven
I shall ever need.

1998

Sunday Morning Services

It was a good morning.
We woke up late,
turned into each others’ bodies,
and fell back asleep.

It was a good morning.
We woke up later,
and did things
that drove our dog
under the bed to hide.

It was a very good morning.
We drifted off
in a naked tangle
that evolved
into a holy cuddle.

1998

The Time of My Life

My favorite time
is when we’re sleeping:
You smile so softly,
your eyelids flutter,
you moan so gently,
and then I touch you.

My favorite time
is when we’re talking:
You listen closely,
your ideas quicken,
you speak so wisely,
and then you touch me.

My favorite time
is when we’re cuddling:
You hold me tightly,
your body settles,
you murmur sweetly,
and then I hold you.

My favorite time
is when we’re living:
You call me firmly,
your two arms open,
you sparkle brightly,
and then you hold me.

1998

Naked with the Bluebells

There’s this image I carry
of you
standing nude and radiant
in a blooming mountain meadow,
eyes closed and beaming
under an open shower
of rainbow and sunlight,
butterflies and moonbeams,
gold dust and laughter,

and of you bathing in this stream,
tempering it,
taming it,
making it yours,
redoubling its light with your own,

dancing and spinning
with arms outstretched,
kicking at the spray
with the glee of a child in a puddle,
drinking of it
from cupped hands,

and splashing it
onto your face,
over your head,
letting it cascade
over your hair, back, and breasts,
belly, bottom, and thighs,
to flow,

lachrymous and honeyed,
down your legs
to the grateful, greedy ground
lying lovelorn at your feet.

That is the image of you
I carry in my soul,
not in my wallet.

1998

Showertime Mantra

I want to wash you.

I want to help the shower
caress your lovely body,
share in its privilege.

I want to work the shampoo
into your golden hair,
then rinse it
and your troubles
away.

I want to soap your back
and massage away
the length of your days.

I want to scrub your feet
and remove the street from them.

I want to lather your belly
and mine it for its joys.

I want to feel my wet hands
glide
over your soapy breasts
and touch the love therein.

I want to wash you,
not because you are dirty,
but because I am unclean.

I want you to baptize me
in the shower
of your love.

1998

Scheduling Error

Primus
You dress for work easily in beautiful things,
made more beautiful by you in them,
while I stir in groggy slumber;
rolling over, I go back to sleep.
Your gentle kiss as you leave
hardly awakens me,
but I smile,
if only inwardly.
The dog jumps up and takes your place —
poorly.

Secundus
Awaking too late and tired,
I return quickly to fitful sleep
peppered with restless dreams.
Dreams set to military cadence.
Dreams of action and resolve.
Dreams in striking Technicolor.
In my dreams I’m a sexual Batman.
In my dreams I am El Greco’s disciple.
In my dreams the answers lie before me.
Poets are jealous of my dreams.
I am stalked for the poems hidden within,
hunted for the verse I excrete:
beautiful nightmare poppyseed visions
to spin Coleridge’s fleshless skull,
violent loving tumescent images
to make Ginsberg’s ghost blush.
All stripped from me by the violence of the ringing telephone bell.

Tertius
Disconnecting the intrusive salesman,
I cuddle the belly-up dog,
before the miracle of soap and toothpaste
performs a modern transubstantiation,
and I, briefly, am replaced by a human being.
Of course it doesn’t take.
I burn my tongue on the coffee,
I burn my fingers on the newspaper,
and pick carelessly at my abandoned cereal,
fascinated by its dissolution.
My drowsy brain dances to the rhythms of my caffeinated heart,
as I swing in a hammock on Dali’s back porch.
The dog, nudging, ends my reverie,
urgency in his quickly yellowing eyes pleading
Open the door!

Quartus
We pass the ball.
We pass the time.
Like father and son.
Like the Father and His Son.
And you,
the absent but ever-present Holy Ghost.
I could heed the call of the yardwork.
I could heed the call of the housework.
I could heed the call of those hungry disks marked “My Novel.”
I heed the call to worship, instead.

Quintus
Driving in isolation,
I am a pilgrim,
as mechanical as the car I steer.
Radio white-noises distill circumlocated idiocy,
shroud me in the too-comfortable blanket of non-thought.
Your convenient, one-stop, multiplex mall and cinema looms,
sunlight glinting off its congregation of Fords, Lexuses, and Volkswagens.
I am here to take communion,
the Body served with salt and butter,
the Blood iced, carbonated, and watered-down.
I enter the inner sanctuary —
four dollars to numb my brain
and sit in respectful darkness
before the flickering idols and lesser gods.

Sextus
Service over,
the taste of crowded loneliness lingers on my tongue
as I look through the other isolates.
Squeezed into a chair too small
for my insulating layer of blubber,
sipping coffee to reignite my tongue
and restart my slowing heart,
I watch,
with increasing disinterest,
the model-perfect,
interchangeably dull,
mini-skirted acolytes to the goddess of commerce.
No promises of future salvation,
just instant gratification
in exchange for a toss in the offering plate.
Plastic preferred.
Only coupons see redemption.

Septimus
Home, then, to the dog,
who barks, but not in English.
He missed me, and I him.
We both miss you.
Too late for a real dinner,
Dog and I microwave something or other,
and he catches the scraps.
The door opens and there you are,
healing, miraculous.
We kiss, and I no longer feel empty:
I am saved.
When you ask,
What did you do today?
I reply,
Nothing.

1997

The Spring of 1744

I think We met
You and I
in 1639
on a train to Amsterdam
or was it on a plane to New Orleans
in 1322?

I’m sure it wasn’t
at the beach
that one We used to walk on
hand in hand
at sunset
those long summer nights
in Moscow
during Ivan’s not so Terrible reign.

But it was
I’m sure
a long time ago
someplace far away
where We met
in a rain
when Bess was Queen
sharing a café table
under an umbrella
sipping Italian coffees
reading poetry
in Paris
or Munich
watching the stars dance
under the sunshine
of our emerging love
that fine spring morning
in Rome
1744
or ’45.

I have known You forever
I know
I know.

Since We met
listening to Socrates speak
to a crowd outside the Louvre
when Pepin was short
We have been everywhere
in each other’s eyes
exploring the wilds
the cafés
the antique shops
the bookstores
the museums
and art galleries
of one another’s hearts.

The sun is still rising
shall ever rise
and never set
on the world of our love
the world We created
when We first met.

1997

Seducing My Wife

You say,
I love you so much,
there just aren’t enough words.

I say,
I know. I agree.
I love you, too,
but words aren’t enough.

You say,
I love you.

I say,
I love you, too,
but sometimes,
like this time,
we need few words
to say it.

You say
nothing,
but murmur in satisfaction
and nod deeper into our embrace.

I say,
Sometimes,
like this time,
we need no words at all,
but with our fingers,
our lips,
and our eyes,
we can tap out the message
on our bodies
in the unwritten code of love.

You say
nothing,
a step ahead of me,
and the silence of your embrace
bears a louder message
than my too many words.

1997