guardian

I will let you rest, for now, laid between the memory and the desire.
Illusions are not in the purse I carry, a stitched sheet of eloquence,
taken from the tongue of elder and smaller gods that are best forgotten.
I will have the scales fall from your eyes and as dries the tears
that were born of the midwife of self-deception, you will know truth
before I know you. For I am not a player with the most dangerous flint,
the heart of a woman. I have seen too many sparks marked as shadows
when the race is over and the chase is won and no one really values the prize.
I will linger, at the very edge of your awareness, a curiosity hovering
between life and death and every breath you are suddenly counting.
Counting the mounting tensions that can only be resolved in clarity
of the charity of the first kiss and touch and surrender, real.


William F. DeVault. all rights reserved.