A fine faded shirt
Posted on May 24, 2007
Filed Under marriage, milestones | 9 Comments
Happy Ten Years to Me and My Better Half
I wrote this poem for My Better Half before we were married. We were college roommates and secret lovers among a household of five. And we’d stop attending classes or parties or doing much beyond just wallowing in each other’s affections whenever we could find a quiet moment away from the others.
I would sneak in to his room after the others had gone out to drink or rabble rouse or, very occasionally, study for the night and, quietly, before dawn, tip toe back to my bedroom before any one was stirring. We were both still involved in long distance relationships with our high school sweet hearts. We were hiding our budding relationship from everyone who knew us, afraid of disapproval, afraid to severe the ties with old flames, afraid to make the full leap, we dabbled…
The slow start of love’s embrace
Strokes sensual flutters
To desire that tastes on lips
Thrusting hungrily
Your way to my heart.Holding tight in rhythm
You leap boldly to the last caress,
Continuing to pulse
As breathless one
We rest.Slowing rapture succumbs to breaking panic
Washing bliss to the shore of my going.I’ll try to tiptoe
You’ll not know I’m gone,
But for my heart
That I’ve left you
In your breast pocket.
A fine faded shirt
Beside the bed.
Eventually we grew careless with our new love. We were discovered and the relationship lost it shadowy espionage. And finally we were married on this day, ten year’s ago. It’s much the same day as it was then- a sparkling, clear, crisp Spring day sandwiched between weeks of rain on either side – the lilacs in bloom, the grass a brilliant green, slightly soft and yielding to an open toed sandal, worn once.
And in ten years I’d like to think that nothing has changed between us. But he and I and everyone knows this can’t be true, no matter how much we want to preserve that lovely thought, there are children now and mortgage payments and car insurance and broken storm doors and shedding pets.
I wonder how that poem would read if I were writing it for the first time, today, after a decade of marriage. I think it would go something like this…
The slow start of love’s embrace
Interrupted by a child’s nightmare
That requires water, a hug
Little kisses on damp lips that
Taste of bubble gum toothpaste.Holding tight to passion
I return to find that
Already you lead boldly in sleep
With heavy breath and rattling snores
You rest.And so we’ll try again tomorrow,
This delay of rapture
Becoming familiar,
Washing us to shore of another day.I’ll try to tiptoe
You’ll not know I’m gone
To start breakfast and feed the dog
But for my heart that I’ve left you
In your breast pocket
Of that damn shirt I’ve asked you
To put in the hamper,
Now discarded beside bed.
It’s still there, that heart of mine, crammed hastily into the pocket of a fine, faded shirt that could find it’s way to the laundry room a little more often.
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