2 September 2001
(scared to draw)

I'd rather touch
And risk rejection
Than lose any missed affection
That would have left his gate
Reverted to a feral state
For want of husbandry
From my more determined
And persistent hand.

I recognize and know quite well
The limits I may take,
And boundaries I may push,
In order to extract the cream
Of what is truly Life-supporting
From the stock he carries in him
Feed it and it comes unwilling
And with protest, but it's coming
So he knows with every demonstration:
The measure that he gives me
Is what returns augmented;
We ride, we do not lift
Two givers gaining from the gift

He husbands my resources better
Than I his, but the soil is much richer
With decaying matter of my past
Littering my darkest forests
Where it lies until it's needed
A nourishment of wisdom
That will temper all the details
In the daily-ness of living
With the one who gets in deeper
To the roots of me than others
And knows where all the bruises are
Because he helped me make ‘em.

So I may look above the ground
And see successive harvests
And forget the minor irritations
That result from constant tending.

In all there's comfort I've not known
Before.

In letting someone else's hand
Manipulate my sources
The synergy of us together
Magnifies us both
The harvest greater than the sowing
Abundance ever-widening with age.