I used to confuse love with pity
I used to map it at night
Among the waters
The blackness
Where I would study it
By candlelight

The oars of sorrow used to elate me
I’d bend my ear down to wood
I’d listen with hollow echoes
To the misery of my loneliness
The gentle lapping of tide
Would repeat this melody
A pattern as sure as the wind is right

It’s within these seas
I once wondered
Drafting loosely
Astute with map and compass
Slaving to brain and hand
But lo, where was my human heart?

Now in daybreak
The dawning sun
Stuns my eyes
I see it coming
On the horizon

The night yielding
With great recompense
To a new day
A day free of control
Of useless neglect
Of separation
Of sorrow
Of confusion now waking

I turn to my palm
And study the lines so familiar
I watch the creases deepen in my flesh
The ones that climbs from wrist to west

It hits me there
Upon the soft swishing of salt
That sorrow is just a feeling
And love,
Love is life


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