I will Tell You This (A Love Song)

(for J.F.R, with thanks to Michael Longley)

I will tell you this;
That love, is the art
Of green hands, nestled
Keen as the root,
In red earth.

Here, where my body
Grows thin and stalk like,
Where you, woman,
Give me life,
A patch of grass, a finger
Turned lily shaped and purple;
Here, love is a reaping,
A marriage, a baptism,

Where my body bends,
Broken backed and rump like,
I search the names of flowers,
Where you hair rests, snug
As the scattering of falling, frail branches,
Dissolving ripples,
Like a mellow monsoon;
Here, love
Is the holding of a breath, a drowning,

I will tell you this;
That love, is the art
Of green hands, nestled
Keen as the root,
In red earth,

For always.