The Ibis are flocking overhead my love,
back dropped by the billowing clouds painted pink and grey
on Winter’s blue sky canvas.
Dusky cattle graze indifferently in Day’s last light,
unaware of the grieving observer passing by
with stinging eyes and salt streaked cheeks.
This heart too was once colourless and cold,
as indifferent as these wind-ruffled cattle;
oblivious to suffering passing near.
You came into my sphere of awareness,
with a loving heart and gentle eyes and calming hands;
impossible to ignore and too lovely to dismiss.
With patience and resolve
you bathed your soft light upon my heart’s dark province
and slowly, very slowly you awakened love in me.
My protective shell you immersed in emollient love until,
awakening tendrils of affection,
you bound my heart to yours with vulnerable devotion.
As a bee’s sting retains much of the bee
so too your departure has taken much from me,
leaving in my heart an irreparable rent.
I will not again return to that calloused shell
that you so carefully softened and undressed;
rather a thousand barbs of grief
than one moment of respite without your essence.
