Painting by contemporary Iranian artist, Nasser Ovissi (photo taken at his home, 2016)
It is when your attention is elsewhere,
that you are beckoned back to your roots.
You are never apart from this love.
Your heart is not inside of you.
It is elsewhere, and you are within it.
So, where is your heart dear one?
Perhaps I’ve kissed you a thousand times,
each more enrapt than the former.
How many non-kisses perfect a kiss?
I’ll live happily counting
what is forever countless.
I orbit your soul,
climbing it’s granite bell tower
to arrive in your church my beloved,
inside your cool mosque,
inside your warm temple.
I sit at the foot of your heart’s wall
inscribed with musical notation
and I play songs of ringing devotion.
With each bite taken,
I feel the pulsing of hunger.
The fruits of desideratum ripen
without having to.
And this having-to is without wanting.
Your sublime presence
incandescing across the stillness in this room.
It is solitude’s warm hands
softly cupped over my ears.
Is it the sound of yours or my blood flowing?
Your specter glides in this way.
In the comb of your lashes,
I feel the brush of each bending tine.
We are this close, so
whose reflection,
I wonder,
waters my enraptured eyes?
Many small steps
between hearts, yours and mine,
I’d take each one,
to feel this friendship,
your distant presence,
infinite steps,
adamantine.
Seal!