The Reign of Love

The aura of joy no longer fills my days

But comes a stranger in a distant hour,

An unexpected guest who rarely stays

Beyond the falling of the briefest flower

Or the passing zephyr's kiss as fleet

As closely held remembrances of love,

Or the poignant recollection of God's feet

Moving wounded through the lives he wove

Enchanted on the magic loom of space.

Delight that once was mine ran deep and sure,

Followed or led in all my reckless pace

As from the jars of heaven grace would pour.

I grew in wonderment, obeyed my soul,

Mind and body followed in its wake,

Before my searchlight eyes a presence stole

Like moonlit clouds across a darkened lake.

The sages speak of calm preparing peace

But since her death the silence is too loud

And never do the hostile spirits cease

Their attempt to cover beauty with a shroud.

If I half dead to life must expiate

The erroneous turnings of a thousand years

Is there yet a way to overcome my fate

And shed the burden of these time-formed tears.

Have the hounds of sorrow bit too deep,

Caused suppurating wounds that will not heal

Or may I rise before the final sleep

To meet the enemy with will of steel

And the glorious renascence of the soul.

Time does not heal, it merely serves to dull

The pain of loss, the vision and the goal

And fill the emptiness with specious lull.

Man enamoured of his current state

Accumulates his baubles seeking fame

Or wealth and power would accumulate

To add to his illustrious name.

If once the body-mind could consecrate

All life experience to rise above

This charted path and reconstruct our fate

Surely would begin the reign of love.