if i were ever to love you,  it
would not be a decision

love isn't like that--
(while i was deciding,
it had already happened.)

i could say that love is a wondrous bird
that flies in no set course
no one knows where or when
it will alight
nor from whence it came
it doesn't fly here to seek a nest

meanwhile the tree never takes
a stance of refusal, its hands are lifted
to the skies--wanting something,
its branches willingly bear
this most beautiful moment

the tree might hope secretly
that the bird will lose its wings
and stay

its feathers glitter more than gold
with an existence more solid than the setting sun

i could say that

love is  your breath wafting through
my hair, your lips so close to my ear
while your heart beats
like a slight tremor
in the earth's core
my fragmented shadow watches from the wall,
until the night and love turn thick, like my hair

an hour of bliss germinates
in your smile
a candle's flame stains the darkness
warm yellow
like your life blazing away, but only now
with the sight of your final radiance,
your unfinished portrait--
all those strokes that
have gone awry,
painted over,
filling in your colours
with my hair's brushstrokes

at midnight, painting your entire body
with my lips, i will portray
the utter sweetness of life

the candlelight will sheath
our loneliness in soft petals..

Love is simple like this.

it is only
the sky with its storms and details
and vast distances
that sometimes delays its flight

poetry --
it feels like my home country,
where the river is a belt of brocade
with the rare scent
of a broken willow twig

my garden wilts in loneliness,
overrun by weeds
covered with dark shadows
and loitering snow

but here i touch the grass gently, lovingly,
as i would the curve of my lover's cheek
all my love and all my hope
i press into this page

where i can find spring
in any season.  here the sun
dispels the darkness
and brings awakening

in a poem it can be forever spring