COWARDICE

I’m doing it again.
I don’t have you,
So I’m seeking others
And they will never be you.

Last time it was easier
I was young and so were they.
But now it seems too late
To admit mistakes and move on.

Now I am sure I have wronged you –
We will never ever be one again.
I should have been stronger for longer -
I should have stuck to our crooked path.

Your dismal destiny is down to me –
Careless as I was and ever wasteful –
You were left to cope with the leftovers
That drove you to scornful rebellion and more.

If I had known they were destroying you,
Would I have rescued you?
With nothing left to lose now
I carry my cowardice like a scar.

How can I expect you to forgive me from the grave?
I feel like Heathcliff - determined to join you.
But what if you rose and rejected me as I dug:
Would we spend eternity as enemies?

PERSIAN PRINCESS III

Tonight I finally had the heart
To cry for you like I did
On the night you were first taken from me.

Tonight I knew you were really gone
And I would never see your eyes again –
Except in a flash of an old memory.

Tonight I lost my hope of love
Because it was locked in you –
Pent up over decades and never spent.

Tonight I saw you in visions
That rose from flickering candles –
Beauty that I never valued enough to save.

Tonight I could hear you in lyrics
And new wave rhythms that jangled –
Making me swoon with longing.

Tonight I drank you in draughts –
Sweet malted swigs of caramel –
Like the exquisite taste of your mouth.

Tonight I could smell the musk
Of your soft body and my hard lust –
And I remembered our love language.

Tonight I could feel the silkiness
Of your downy skin with its beads of sweat –
And I delighted in our desire.

Tonight I could do nothing
Except regress into regret
At a loss beyond losing.

Tonight I had no other urge
But to kneel by your grave
And weep enough tears to stir the ground.

Tonight I resolved to journey
Halfway across the world that killed you
So I could be by your side again.

Tonight I decided that you
Had been everything I ever really wanted -
But I failed to realise how much.

Tonight I understood at last
That all my other failures were nothing –
Much, much less than nothing.

Tonight I deleted the rest of it
As so much meaningless dross
So I might visit you untrammelled.

Tonight I wanted to drive you home –
Along Kourosh-e-Kabir and left at Khiaban-e-Pars –
To a place we two still inhabit as one.

PERSIAN PRINCESS II

The news

Of your death

Shredded me

Like random shrapnel

From a roadside bomb.

Jagged thorns

Tore ragged holes

In my old heart

And left it ridden

With shabby scars.

But I am so lucky

Because I knew you.

I saw you –

Watched you from a distance

At first,

And then

Looked into your eyes.

I touched you –

Sensed your warmth,

And knew I was

So close to heaven.

I talked with you –

Heard the symphonies

That sprang from your voice –

The songs in your Persian phrasing.

I walked with you –

Kept you by my side

So others knew

We were together

And you

Had chosen me.

I laughed with you –

And you were so funny

As you teased me

And told me things

I never would have known.

I worked with you –

Solved problems –

And found solutions,

As we discovered

Each other.

I loved you –

Brief moments –

Stolen and stored away,

Before we wept,

Separated and bereft.

I wondered about you –

Long years of other

As we grew old

And walked our paths.

I sought you –

Too late it seems –

And long after

Your pain was gone.

I am left

With holes

In my heart

And scars

Set forever.

Sometimes I dream of you

And some of the smallest

Holes in my heart

Are filled for a moment.

Sometimes I talk to you

And I hear you answer

In your sing-song voice

That pleases my ears.

Sometimes I pray for you

And God tells me

Not to worry –

For He has rescued you.

Sometimes I lust for you –

The hardest cut of all.

Your beauty rises up

And falls against me, softly.

Sometimes I simply love you

And my heart’s scars

Are salved so sweetly

With the joy of privilege.

You were special.

You were unique.

You were too much

For a man like me.

And yet,

After decades,

I still see your face

As it was then –

Nothing compares

And nothing ever will.