Thee Constructed: A Love Poem

1.   I’ve built many a wall.

Out past the pastures

lies a yellow meadow, lush

with bees and buttercups.

I’ve walked where my workboots are

let down with each soft step

by thickly woven shoots.

It is there where you

and I are

mostly intertwined, melded

like brick upon brick,

my mind to your mind.

My body too is a shell,

a husk you’ve planted, furrowed,

hoed as your desires dictate,

clocking time until I’ve returned home.

O, pity your barrow’s wheel

has sprung a sprocket.

I’m pained to watch you

from afar, your basket

filled with lilies,

the weight of which drain

the joy you’ve held

in your belly.

Your neck, you feel, reacts

with each inch

my carriage slips over

the rim of your former world.

But oceans of tears

are the drip that feeds seeds.

Together, we are that quivering sprig

that juts from bunked earth.

2.   I’ve passed mountains and rivers

to build cathedrals, erect nunneries, but

you are every stone I quarry,

every piece I lay.

You’re an edifice,

a massive house of worship

towering over heathans.

Into the sky I build you.

Were I drawn

to distant Orient nations,

I’d raise you once again

to show the cold world my love.

I’d hire an army

to protect you, defend your

holy places

to the bitter end.

Were you assaulted by Visigoths,

I’d raise a wall. Stormed by samurai,

I’d train wooly mittened ninjas

to repel down your glorious buttresses.

3.   As I travel

you lay me to rest at night

and resurrect me with your morning.

I’m withering and turning to ash,

tired of having cut stone

in place of you.

I’m eating curry paste and unleavened bread

instead of dulling my knife

over your crusted sour loaves.

I miss your yeast

you keep by screw jar

in the pantry downstairs.

In gentle places

and dangerous lands filled with pitas,

your lips mouth secrets to me.

Alone, I hold myself

betrothed to my love of you,

while you are home with our farm—

hands kneading, kneading.