You whisper, “You have loved enough
Leonard Cohen, You Have Loved Enough
Now let me be the lover”
I overheard you talking in your dream:
I don’t want to go to the hospital.
I sit up to look at you:
A pale, porcelain skin that used to be the white canvas
for Van Gogh’s sunflowers paintings
has now turned into a wrinkle chewing gum wrapping paper.
I don’t want to go to the hospital,
you say, while clinging onto the blanket and convulsing on our broken bed.
The sound of the bed cracking underneath the weight of the both of us
sounds like my heartbeat at that moment.
I hold you down, whispering gently into your ears:
Don’t worry, my darling, don’t worry.
You are not going anywhere without me,
and I won’t let the white blouse of the calloused psychiatrists
haunt you in your sleepless nightmare.
I don’t want to go to the hospital, heaving on the crackling bed,
you breath your will into existence.
Wiping the tears off your face, I pray to my non-existent faith,
my non-existent G-d,
and every other non-existent religions:
She has loved enough,
please let me be the lover.
As the sun rises above the darken curtained windows,
you open your eyes – what are you seeing?
Though the reflection in your eyes is me,
but do forgive me, my darling,
the dark cloud and the heavy mist of the tears-filled irises
is stopping me from believing that it is me you are seeing.
I don’t want to go to the hospital, you repeat, and I know,
today, again, is not one of your better days.
And when will it be –
I gather you in my arms, like a gathering a water basket full of holes –
when will it be your better days again?
Let’s go see the sunflower fields when the season comes, you whisper on my chest.
Yes, darling, I answer, and in that brief moment,
I feel as if everything I ever wanted is right here with me.
Everything everything.
*****************
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