let me just say:    that your voice
is the lasting echo of my heart's calling.
even tonight, when i feel like
i'm a little feverish, a little drunk
on whiskey, you are the river
bridging the speaking 
and the listening banks,
the lintel bright above my face
the threshold dark beneath my feet,

you are all the missing verses
in my poems, the ivy branching around
my ankles, clinging to my knees
entwining every moment of my waking;
my measured safety traded for a future,
my outcome and my belonging;
my heart's steep path--

and everywhere you are
is home to me now.  your words unlock
all the rooms my days wait inside.
you are the burning mystery
beyond your own understanding,
the rest of every story,
the bell tolling night without circumference;

the living light i see by,
the captive i would ransom with my life