Eternal beauty

Who will find a way through this silence
         to the word to the warm breath
at the centre of this labyrinth of tears
         and tribulations ?

Who will count the sparrows with
         moving lips or number the budding
flowers on the English rose
         as they open to embrace the light ?

There is no destiny other
         than that shaped in the words
we act out
         in the narratives we carve
from life

Love is an address of the heart
         a shifting domicile of tenderness
in which our most precious words
         are guarded
a tabernacle of the soul
         venerated in our daily gestures

There is one altar
         the body upon which
our blood is partnered
         skin and bone bound by muscles
that coalesce rhythmically

likewise the passing seasons
         that bind us to time
and in which we must learn
         to extemporize / to improvise
humbled by the sparrow
         by the marigolds that adorn
the fields

Beauty is breath returned
         a kiss peppered with passion
a shiver down the spine
         a spasm of eternity made flesh

John Lyons