The One True Love

The One True Love

My one true love,

Not a person

A name

Or even a face;

Formlessness forever in search of corporeal existence

When I look at him

You gleam with honeyed light

Flowing from his eyes

(unawares)

bathing me in golden sweetness

filling my mouth with delight

I cannot encompass you

Not even when he takes me in his arms

Night after night

In an intimate embrace;

The skin that yields

To my touch

Will not contain you

You find expression

(but not incarnation)

in a succession

of bodies that pass silently

through my life

each with its own unique capacity

to express your formless allure

my one true love,

you shine forth from them all

but are contained in none

it is true, we all will love only once,

but that love will be expressed

in myriad bodies

moving through our physical reality

in rhythm with our breath

we all know this love when we taste it,

it leaves a tang of sweetness mixed

with our own blood, the harvest of past suffering,

in our mouth

but never mistake

the vase for the heady, fragrant blooms it holds;

if the flower is not the fragrance

how much less the vase