A Wrong Turn

The Promise

In a curious loneliness of friends,

despite the quiet regard of strangers,

we beg our days - so fast and few - not fade,

but lie like snow, the virgin fall that sings

audacious promise and begs us step into

a world renewed, where scars are hid and

tired paths are lost to love's adventure.

In the coldest reckoning of our hours,

as frosts are whispered through our night,

I crave the comfort of your creased smile,

the shudder of your aching limbs,

your weary arms that give up the promise

of your quickening, breaking, bleeding heart:

the safer silence of another year.