Twenty

On this cold and blustery winter solstice, the year’s darkest day, Cindy Lou and I celebrate our twentieth wedding anniversary.  For this momentous occasion, a new poem:  

Twenty

for Cindy Lou

1.

Back in the summer of 1989 what I knew 

about you most was your unhappiness 

in a marriage you wish you hadn’t gotten into. 

It was that fall when you made your break.

We had talked often in my office in Storck Hall

after classrooms and hallways emptied of kids,

when all that was left was grading and planning.  

Still, we spent hours instead, talking, taking care, and listening. 

It was, of course, the S.E.T. for Life retreat that reset mine. 

We were assigned facilitating a MicroLab, hoping to give 

a handful of kids an insight into understanding

how life can be complicated, yet manageable. 

I can remember working with you in that meeting place

populated with young people, sensing for the first time 

how graceful it felt to move kids through a class activity

with a teaching partner that required everyone present to trust. 

Later, we sat up into the wee hours in that church camp lounge, 

alone, talking about my little girls, your changing life, 

my love of Hog Island and Emily, and sometime 

before 4 am, when we figured we had better get some sleep, 

I took the ultimate risk of telling you how beautiful you are.  

2.

That was then.  This is now:

our having found our own way to manageably move 

through life’s complications in search of a home with  

a partner capable of love enough to overcome personal history.

It wasn’t always easy, but in the process of our

storming and norming over these last twenty-plus years, 

I have so wanted to provide the brother’s acceptance 

and the unconditional love you have hungered for.

For me, I am grateful to have been blessed by your 

beauty and grace and the care you exhibit to ensure 

I have the stuff I need and the time to pursue 

the birds and words and images that somehow complete me.

On this occasion of our being wed twenty years -- 

time that has eclipsed every couple relationship either 

of us has ever known -- I find myself humbled by

the healing power you bring to my mindful existence.

I wonder how many more years we have. 

I wonder how much more we will be allowed to be present 

to the kids we love so much and for a world playing out it’s time in history. 

But whatever time that is, know that I will be there with you, 

holding your diamond hand, your partner ‘til eternity. 

Today’s elder idea:   Anything worth thinking about is worth singing about. 

Bob Dylan

via Mary Oliver

I’ll assume that works for poetry, too.