Love is a dream
or so they say,
my winter heart,
it begs to play
“unfreeze me please”
you’ll hear it say
“for I miss the warmth of summer.”

And love is young
though I am old,
they say it can
unwind the cold
like ticking clocks
and bells of old;
echoes fading into silence.

And love is kind
but I am scared
of fangs beneath
the lips you bear.
The last one said
he also cared,
so I am slow to trusting.

‘Cause love is cruel,
and I’m not new;
affected words
and lover’s cues,
strangled trust
and selfhood, too,
I’ve the eulogies to prove it.

But love is birth;
it can give life.
If I could let
the dead horse lie,
and promise you
that I will try
to want to become different.

To love at all
is to have felt
your stolen heart
transcend yourself,
blessed by the hand
of God Himself,
the seeming giver of your dreams,

but to love again,
it is a choice,
to speak aloud
in broken voice,
“Though it may hurt,
still I rejoice,
though it may end,
still I rejoice,
take all I am,
still I rejoice,”
and try, though hard it seems,
to remember how to dream.
Remember how to dream.

You pull me
                        D
                            O
                               W
                                   N
My mind says no
but my body is agreeing to your ripping claws
poisonous tendrils
nematocysts
I can only see you in the right light
translucency blending in the oceans tide
where I am
                D
                  R
                    O
                     W
                       N
                         I
                          N
                           G
                         I want to be saved
here comes the next wave
I go under again
Down to the bottom to never be
                                                        F
                                                          O
                                                            U
                                                              N
                                                                D
A gurgling bubbling twisted crown
the only tiny remaining

S
  O
    U
      N
         D
As it hits the silent sandy ocean bottom.

Cherie Nolan © 2016

I am no rock
my heart
is not made
of tiny bits
of stone
it will not
be crushed
like a pile
of ground-up bone
it might be
washed upon
shores
like the most
miniscule of
treasures
found in sand,
unseen to
naked eye
yet so full of
iridescent magic
in a spectrum of colors
a secret world
unto its own
those almost
invisible shapes
jeweled corals
of earth
up from
sea  bottom
in foamy
rebirth
but I will take it
(yes, my heart,
in rawness
and thunder)
and hold it
and nurse it
before it goes under
I will rock it
and soothe it
before it calcifies
as the ocean
invites endless
salt from
my
eyes