a Christian riposte

It is impossible to understand

how you –

with your venerable looks

that betray all those worrisome years

raising four daughters

loving one wife

restoring an old Victorian

planting tulip and daffodil bulbs thoughtfully around trees

to bloom happy colors every spring

tending to a forgetful, 80-year-old father

and the Missouri River flood that

damaged the farm that fed families for generations -

It is impossible to explain

how you –

tightly woven into the patchwork quilt

landscape and the tallgrass prairie

in the heart of the corn belt

have seeped into my achromatic life

like tealeaves transform

water into a steamy elixir,

soothing my apprehensive affections.

Is it impossible to decipher

how the unhurried bonds

that knit two hearts together

have reached beyond the clouds

like redwood titans in the NW corner,

or, like that giant globe of twine

wound layer-by-layer,

tangled piece-by-piece,

an immovable universe born

from a single string?

How letter-by-letter, word-by-word,

a seed became a forest?

Stories exchanged for stories

of wanderlust, family dramas and deaths,

graduations and vacations

over dinners shared,

sometimes lips paired

with passion talks and city walks –

within library walls, museum halls,

or garden paths and hours passed

over treasure maps.

Those, with their slapdash scrutiny

cannot appreciate your exalted beauty

housed within a poetic heart

traveling alongside mine

revealing an immaculate image

of my own complexion

clearer than any reflection shining from

a glassy, pacific pond.

How could they possibly see

how you –

can make me feel

more like me?