Love for Travis

haunts & hounds me

& goes unspoken

though it has always been thus

with no ash

or decay

or sting or

defeat...

As it always may have been

without this sweet intervention,

this promise...

this prayer.

Part of me has known that

& ached to say that

for the longest moment...

The shortest lifetime...

This ageless heartbeat.

And now that I've admitted this

to myself...

to him...

& to everyone in this -

my compromised confession...

I wonder if it's too late?

As part of me rages still...

Part of me wants to know why those

3 words are required from me - are expected of me -

desired of me... When I'm already giving so much more

of myself than I've given anyone since the last boy I loved

wounded me so deeply.

Is there no room for subtlety? Do I have to mouth whisper

sing say shout those words? Why must they even be in the

equation when I've been telling him with

every action

every poem

every e-mail

every smile

every kiss

& every instant message.

Does it have to be so blatant? The blind are not stupid...

they are only blind... or so I keep telling myself.

And now that I have admitted it here -

will he even believe me when he finally hears

those words

from my lips?

Will he think them a polite lie, told

to bind him to me after a night of silent anger

& sorrow & grief?

Why should he believe me when my silence could

not convince him?

Words are like the wind & mean nothing in the end

but what I have done will remain forever...

unless deleated

forgotton

erased

or destroyed by fire, anger, jelousy, rage or apocalypse.

I never asked him to tell me

or believed when he did...

words truly falling on deaf ears.

For how could someone love others with so little

love for himself.

I had to open my eyes & see in the action of life -

his eyes shine...

his boyish smile...

his adult passion...

his unspoken depth of love - to believe it.

The deaf & the blind

& the mute all combined...

With my newly naked soul

Within this fate I've been consigned...

For even though these words are written -

Even though I have not spoken -

This silent speech...

From my silence impeached...

From the depths of my soul:

My silence is broken.

- For Travis -

Who's own brief silence was as loud

& unbearable as the silence that inspired it.