As The Children Sleep

Make no mistake, Eros, you call to us all. See

how the father curls anguished in that

sweaty comforter, twisting

in that unfulfilled gnawing -- that slight glimpse

of pale flesh, as the cashier bends to grab

a paper bag, the soft curve of lashes,

lifting from the green eyes

of the substitute teacher. But see, the mother too

curls away, gnawing restless

in her own secret - how that gentle face

hungrily devoured the entirety

of her aging form, how that worn T-shirt

stretched across his taut frame, his wet mouth - open,

bending to meet her trembling lips. Yes Eros,

you claw at the heart, always beyond the horizon, just

past this one next ridge. And what will become

of this ordinary couple; each curled

away from the other, clinging

to their secrets, gasping for one

last breath, that vague sense of the immortal? Who can say?

But love, true love lies waiting -

that heroic search, that epic quest -- not

some quest in search for some new someone, some

colorful present waiting, wrapped beneath some tree. No.

True love is the truly great quest, not a search for the other, but with

the other. Together we search

the depths of ourselves, troweling beneath

the crust, the stacks of dishes

and missed appointments,

even the terrifying realization of just how full

of shit I truly am. But there,

like a tiny leak, a quiet dripping,

trickling from the dense cement

of the heart, it lives.

Can you feel it? That impossible tenderness,

as he turns to her, and she to him and they embrace, and

once more merge, filling themselves with each other

like human beings. Can you hear them as they

cry in the darkness? “Oh, my sweet

love, how I missed you.”