i remember that night
we talked on the phone
my heart full, no overfull, no…
my heart hungry, growing hungrier
the more you talked, and i tasted
salt and caramel, i tasted chocolate
dark and deliciously so creamy
and sweeter than the dark and quiet night.

i sat, a fire burning deep inside me
as you hauled bucket after bucket
of water from the wells of quiet healing…

(oh the hues of your voice were
the sun glistening and dancing thru
my mind’s blinds, whirling like a ballerina
and throwing off the colors of the rainbow
in every lilt and laugh and tear-stained murmur
of mercy rising, falling, rushing, washing)

you poured those buckets carefully
one by one upon the hurty fire
inside me raging always
for years of years and days of nights so bleak
and lonely in the frozen quiet silence,
and the cool droughts miraculous caresses
from cloud angels swooping down over me
so drippy and divine and joyous fine.

your voice smiled, reassured “i’ll be right back”
as you scurried off bucket bouncing up
and down and keeping time against your churning
legs, your dancing legs, your spinning legs
aleaping over walls and twirling as you
whistled past my silent sad lost graveyards.

i waited until you were out of sight,
then rose up quickly and i ran straight to
the deadwood shed of my mind and recklessly
grabbed big armfuls of deadfalls, snags, widowmakers
and threw them in that fire!  yeah, i stoked it,
banked it and I banked on you and your heart,
the cool water wonder of your watery return.

when you got back, your eyes widened, surprised
and firelight shone in them brightly, glittering
gold and orange within those deep and darkling
pools of tender mercy…tender mercies

but then a fiercer fire flared up!
gleamed great and spun across the dark and gorgeous
circle of your eyes like galaxies, and
eclipsed the fire minor there reflected,
with a fire fierce and burning outside time.

and I saw you look at me, look into me,
i saw you see thru me with smiles and then
you looked down at your bucket and threw your head
back gentle and you laffed, upturned it slow, deliberate
and poured it drippy silver on that blaze of
despair so icy hot and on the black night
burning cold and lonely so long in my soul.

i could have sat forever, salty chocolate
on my lips and honey dripping in my heart
beneath that silver crystal chorus singing
of redemptive rivers pouring, roaring, ringing

but when the bucket emptied, well, i saw
your heart there, beating red and steady
at the bottom, (yeah, at the bottom!)

i knew then that your steady journeys over
to the riverbed for water were just part
of the dance, giving me the chance to throw my past
and future in that fire…because it was
from your heart water poured, unending shimmering
purples and blues-glad, golds, argent greens
aglowing, and dove greys as soft as love.

“i’ll always be right back” you said,
and the words waltzed off your tongue in arabesque
and touched the drab plain usual around me
with frequencies beautiful, more beautiful
than all the sounds of many waters dancing.

and i amazed sat watching you walk away,
each step a promise of return, and i?
i finally figured out the frame of friendship
i realized at last your masterplan
as i bathed in those harmonics and i swam
within those hues giv’n us by space, and time,
and distance, ever deepening the warp and weft
of us, the woven we that’s fresh and growing
in territories claimed by the banner “Everfree”.

and then the taste of chocolate faded, sleepy
eyes descended and my heart began
to drift off in harmonics and in hues
of time redeemed and time extended and
eternity invading us forever
forever and forever and a day.