Eros

  
Eros 

For every woman who, from pleasure, sighed,
For every man who heard that sigh and felt
The bond between be strengthened even more,
I now put pen to paper.  I had knelt
In supplication, in my callow youth,
Before the ancient goddess and had prayed
But when I served instead her human form,
I knew my faith would never be betrayed.

For though a woman, like a man, can stray,
The thrill that’s felt, when hands have touched or when
The consummation reaches inner depths,
Will still be there - as insight stays, in Zen.
And you might say.  “It’s foolishness to place
Such weight on fleeting things - like sun and rain,
The passions and the loves of humans pass -
But leave behind their residues of pain.”

And you are right, of course, but so am I,
For even though my love be only such
As I imagined in my dreaming,  I
Have felt, in every cell, its tingling touch,
And feeling this, awakened, saw anew
The outer and the inner worlds and so
Was by that eros so transfigured that
I needed then divinities no more.

For every woman who has uttered sighs
And heard her lover’s utterance as well,
And felt that bond between be strengthened, I
Now write these lines and in that sighing dwell.
And some might say that this is foolishness
And they are right, of course, but so am I.
But who agrees with me, excepting when
From parted lips there rises, soft, the sigh?

Like mother’s love and all that’s innocent,
The joy of eros cleanses heart and mind.
It sweeps away the dirt and dust of time.
Where harshness was, it leaves perception kind.
It cures the dullness that’s our time’s disease.
It levels high and low, for eros comes
Unbidden and cannot be kept by force
Or wages, but in joyful freedom hums.

And so, when eros leaves, do not attempt
To lure it back or threaten it with woe.
Be grateful then that you were touched by it,
And being grateful, let it freely go.
For though the loss is painful, let it be.
The pain of losing love - of woman, man -
Of parent, child or friend - is harsh, indeed -
And eros is where all of these began.

2015 January 26th, Mon.
Brooklyn, New York