Twenty-three years upon love’s road
Yet still, the path remains unknown
At times, I was the one who struck
But most, I fell with wounds alone
Twenty-three years, O book of love
Still on the first page, here I stay
All that I’ve lived, mere fragments of
A dream, illusions swept away
All my poems never lied
But fate betrayed what they could mean
Twenty-three winters, I was the cold
With no warm hands, no in-between
No fire of love, no heat of grace
No rescue from my inner fears
I read you now, O book of love
And silence is all that appears
Where is the one who vowed me light
She never came to break the dark
So give me one last page to write
Perhaps I’ll find life in the dark
Perhaps the silence in my chest
Was space for something yet to grow
And what began in shadowed ink
Will end in words the light can know
How many times I said, “It’s done”
But love returns like distant rain
It comes in whispers, then strikes deep
A dream, a sword, a flash of pain
I wish I never touched this book
Nor wrote my name upon its lines
Each tale within me only bleeds
Each chapter filled with hollow signs
Twenty-three years, yet still I search
For who I was or hoped to be
I ask my heart, “Were you the song
Or just a ghost that mimicked me”
Oh Lord, don’t bring the past again
Its days were cold, its roads were torn
Let this love I now pen down
Be not a love but grace reborn
Let my heart rest, it’s traveled far
Through every road, through every plea
It dreams no more of victory
Nor fears the storm’s calamity
Twenty-three years and now this love
Has taught me how to just be me
Not the brave knight, not the dreamer
But one who’s learned to simply see
So now I fold the book of love
It’s time to close the aching arc
There’s nothing left in pages worn
For all within has turned to dark