When you reached for my hand
\nPondering for less than a second to accept my invitation
\nI realized something within me had not stirred for quite some time
\nI gaze at the words collecting dust on my shelves
\nThe volumes of lives I\u2019d not ever lived
\nWondering when I would join them
\nSometimes I believed the cover had been closed on my life
\nI forgot a key ingredient of ink is sunlight
\nAnd for while candles calm and lamps burn
\nLesser fires are extinguished
\nAnd nobody reads in the dark
\nI remember the story of Hanukkah
\nWhere the survivors of tragedy waited eight days
\nAnd the oil meant for three nights
\nFueled five more
\nThe oil I use to write my longings and desires
\nMy wondering, fears, and life entire dry
\nIn all my time aging, I thought distance would save me
\nFrom the yelling, from the silence
\nI thought my life would be mine had I my own tomb to die in
\nSeparate from the rest
\nSo I waited there for eight days
\nAnd when that time was spent
\nI forgot my journey and stayed
\nWaiting for the sands of time to flay my skin and grind my bones to dust
\nTo sit on a shelf
\nThat was the point at which I had found myself
\nWhen the darkness was all that I could trust
\nYet I don\u2019t need sight to feel your hand
\nI don\u2019t need thoughts to understand
\nHow you make me feel when the sheets pull tight around us and I hold you close
\nYou taught me how to love through the hurt
\nYou taught me that love shouldn\u2019t burn
\nThat it kindles and preserves
\nWhen I chose you my dear, I know I chose love
\nThose were the terms I chose to paint my canvas on
\nThat was the word I\u2019d live my life for, that filled the starry night sky,
\nit was the word that set me free, had me reborn
\nAnd in your eyes I see the light of your soul which reaches ever higher
\nPast the galaxies beyond the farthest grasp of earthly fire
\nThe source of light and warmth in a clueless menagerie of space and time through heartbreak and bloody breathing in corners and in bathroom stalls
\nFalling upwards into heaven when you breath life into my walls
\nAll this and more
\nWhen I am in your company
\nEvery heart beats my dear
\nBut none moves me like yours
\nAnd the blood that runs through it
\nIs thicker than oil<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
James Friedman When you reached for my hand Pondering for less than a second to accept my invitation I realized something within me had not stirred for quite some time I gaze at the words collecting dust on my shelves The volumes of lives I\u2019d not ever lived Wondering when I would join them Sometimes… <\/p>\n