Terms of Love
So then we dove into a lake of fire,
that we might prove ourselves in tests of love
and show them, yes, we were indeed afire
with all that ardor, all that cunning fire
that might shield from view our deep disgrace,
as all those cherubs with their swords of fire
are said to form a phalanx ranked in fire
that guards the gates of paradise - no water
can douse those flames, instead we crave pure water
that might, if thrown aright, yet stoke our fire
to burn with such an incandescent light
it just might set our stony hearts alight . . .
ah, come, let's say aloud, We fled the light.
For yet, one might protest, what of that fire
that we've forgotten, fire that brings to light
the bodies of those tortured with delight,
the bloodless rapist who, to feign true love,
will hold on to his best girl ‘til the light
of dawn shows all our shows of love as light
and airy fictions, our heroic grace
the ancient engine firing our disgrace.
It's not for us, this shadow play of light.
O bring us air, o bring us cold, clear water.
I gasp to think of how, along the water,
men sat in crumbling bars and asked to water
their whiskey on the cheap or guzzle light,
diluted wine and beer. I prayed that water
might come and wash away our failure, water
cascading down one sunlit day, sapphire
and cold. Earth's a condensate of water,
or so I'm told by one who lived by water
and with his bread found something I'd call ‘love,'
except that he just couldn't seem to love
the one who gave that vision of deep water,
dry land afloat and coursing with sure grace
along the oceanic tide to grace
the court of heaven as a bauble. Grace
can seem as strange, as deep, as cold as water
in which we drown. Forget heroics - grace
is nothing if we win it through that grace
found native in each limb, that fading light
you'll find in every seedy fall from grace
occasioned by what seemed an act of grace.
Dark shreds of cloud migrate before the fire
breaks out upon us all. For us, that fire
is nothing but the wage of our disgrace,
our solitary raving wrought from love
of Nothing, with its vain idea of love.
I'll never sing a threnody for love
and thread a lie: my song would tell of grace,
of that astonished Bride I've come to love.
It's just – somewhere a wraith is cowering, love
denied along with bread and even water:
so as I loaf about and sigh with love
for all the hidden goodness of that Love
who moves the wheeling sky and shatters light
across the waters, still my head feels light
and giddy at the dark desire to love
no more while one lost soul is raked with fire.
But no, love calls us to a world of fire.
It's long since passed, the chance to quench that fire
that sweeps across each city, set alight
by nothing really. We can only seek the water
that drowns us all within an act of grace
so violent I can only call it love.
So then we dove into a lake of fire,
that we might prove ourselves in tests of love
and show them, yes, we were indeed afire
with all that ardor, all that cunning fire
that might shield from view our deep disgrace,
as all those cherubs with their swords of fire
are said to form a phalanx ranked in fire
that guards the gates of paradise - no water
can douse those flames, instead we crave pure water
that might, if thrown aright, yet stoke our fire
to burn with such an incandescent light
it just might set our stony hearts alight . . .
ah, come, let's say aloud, We fled the light.
For yet, one might protest, what of that fire
that we've forgotten, fire that brings to light
the bodies of those tortured with delight,
the bloodless rapist who, to feign true love,
will hold on to his best girl ‘til the light
of dawn shows all our shows of love as light
and airy fictions, our heroic grace
the ancient engine firing our disgrace.
It's not for us, this shadow play of light.
O bring us air, o bring us cold, clear water.
I gasp to think of how, along the water,
men sat in crumbling bars and asked to water
their whiskey on the cheap or guzzle light,
diluted wine and beer. I prayed that water
might come and wash away our failure, water
cascading down one sunlit day, sapphire
and cold. Earth's a condensate of water,
or so I'm told by one who lived by water
and with his bread found something I'd call ‘love,'
except that he just couldn't seem to love
the one who gave that vision of deep water,
dry land afloat and coursing with sure grace
along the oceanic tide to grace
the court of heaven as a bauble. Grace
can seem as strange, as deep, as cold as water
in which we drown. Forget heroics - grace
is nothing if we win it through that grace
found native in each limb, that fading light
you'll find in every seedy fall from grace
occasioned by what seemed an act of grace.
Dark shreds of cloud migrate before the fire
breaks out upon us all. For us, that fire
is nothing but the wage of our disgrace,
our solitary raving wrought from love
of Nothing, with its vain idea of love.
I'll never sing a threnody for love
and thread a lie: my song would tell of grace,
of that astonished Bride I've come to love.
It's just – somewhere a wraith is cowering, love
denied along with bread and even water:
so as I loaf about and sigh with love
for all the hidden goodness of that Love
who moves the wheeling sky and shatters light
across the waters, still my head feels light
and giddy at the dark desire to love
no more while one lost soul is raked with fire.
But no, love calls us to a world of fire.
It's long since passed, the chance to quench that fire
that sweeps across each city, set alight
by nothing really. We can only seek the water
that drowns us all within an act of grace
so violent I can only call it love.
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