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Love Notes

(subjects and verbs)

What does love say?

It speaks

(not like our first voice in the morning,

though it can be funny)

Sometimes I can’t hear it

Sometimes I don’t want to

It speaks through rain,

When there’s sun

It speaks through weather’s extremes

If only to say,

What have you done to me?

We’re not stupid

We could hear love, if we wanted to

I could hear love

And on a day when it’s convenient,

I guess I do

Though sometimes love has

To hit me on my abstract head,

I am so slow about it

I speak, and does it hear?

It speaks, and do I listen?

The world isn’t helping

The world is a hateful place just now

Some people try to make it so,

Thinking profit and elections come from this

These are frightened people

One word from you,

And they’d feel better

But then there’s listening

Not to mention will

Things that are required of us

The fences we take down

The walls that aren’t protecting anything

But I can answer for myself

And hope the best

I’ll try to get it right

Finding what has feathers

In the world

Calming down my own noise

So your astounding silence

When it’s silent

Might speak a library of wisdom

And I might hear the words

Of those who know them for the living

And in a hateful world,

You are always something more

You were not invented yesterday

I think I might have heard you in creation

Not to mention procreation

When you’re there, too

And your siblings,

Action and accountability,

They often have their say as well

Outshouting our own Herods

In the last

Yes, there is hate

I’m already tired of it

You are better

There is anger

You are clearer

There is scorn

You are stronger

There is violence

You are the answer

There is fear

You quiet needless (or the needful) storms

Nothing is stronger on this world or any other

(nothing we’ll take to space is better)

Though many try perversion,

You are a proper peace that will not break

Give me something, please

When I ask it

I’ve always been too slow in hearing you

So much for me to understand

You’re pervasive

Sometimes we’re tricky

But there is authentication—

When it’s good and true, it’s you

That should be enough

There can be contraindications,

Yet we can be smart

Serpents and doves

They say God is you,

But you are not God

A problem with a linking verb

Love can be turned

We could say, then it’s not love

Though cleverness unsuits you

It’s simply this

There’s love

And we can have it

Setting down a certain, sadder source of fire

Stepping away from broken glass

Turning down the volume

So there’s more than our voice, declaiming

Listen

Pay attention

This is not school, and there won’t be a grade

But only life

Life better off when we invite you

You may settle in

(Love hears scoffing)

You think this is dull?

You think love doesn’t excite you?

Then you’ve been getting sex all wrong

And jogging

Working

Cleaning up

Pretty much anything worth doing

You do this life without me

Well, I guess you already know

Try something that’s a real challenge

Deceit is too easy

The most difficult is love,

Then it’s easy

(there is a book about it, more than one

good examples there and outside, too

you might know them by name)

You want to use all of you,

You want reward?

I’ll take you on

Yes, you

You’ll find no greater challenge

Or, frankly,

A sweeter and more thorough ever after

C L Couch

Photo by Setyaki Irham on Unsplash

Bandar Lampung, Kota Bandar Lampung, Lampung, Indonesia