Valentine’s Day

Your soul is a chosen landscape . . .

~Paul Verlaine (1869)

We dedicate Valentine’s Day to mysteries—
to the fierce love of breathing bodies and
the green-growing flora that nurtures them.

We dedicate this day to mothers, earth,
and creation’s two lights—the greater that
governs day, the lesser that governs night.

Today we surrender ourselves to love 
our bodies, to put gender aside and
see potential in them, to celebrate.

Together or alone, we each caress
outlines, circumference, hair, and topsoil—
containers of the beating heart of time.

Warm, wet, and wild. Deep, dark, devoted.
In close or beyond reach, we touch with hearts,
with minds and souls. We love in dark. And light.

We dedicate Valentine’s Day (with or
without saints), to mysteries we have
in common, to molecules, to nature.

This is the gift I found here on the earth.
This is the gift I want to leave to you.
If you could look, you'd see it in my eyes.

I'll pretend you are here in person—

as if this is the last Valentine's Day—

while one of us can still touch in the dark.

For earthweal weekly challenge: THE WILD DARK (NOIR FIRE)

My blog poems are rough drafts.

Please respect my copyright.

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© 2022 Susan L. Chast