Love’s presence

You are gone now

We will never walk down those familiar streets again

And this afternoon I remembered

How often

We reached a place of tenderness

After all of the hurting was done

I don’t fully understand

How my heart came to be closed

And to fear always

That any love given

Would automatically be taken

But I am beginning to see

How I held my heart back

In fear of being hurt

And if it is true that so often we erect shields

Due to past pain

To counter love’s presence

Then these words are true

Your task is not to seek for love

But merely to seek and to find

All the barriers within yourself

That you have built against it

The barricaded heart is not free

And the heart that has not been able to

Open fully to its own joy and sorrow

Is not a heart

Fully capable of containing the true force of love

Which is the only one that can heal us

Uniting our torn apart fragements

So now

In the quiet of an evening

All alone

When memories come

Of our final year

And of the moments glimpsed

When a great love

Could not come to pass

Due to so many obstacles

I just open my heart to the truth

Surrender my mind

And let the tears fall

Remembering

What is given to us

Is only given for a time

But what remains

When the leaving is done

Is the precious memory

Of the calm and healing that comes

As we open our heart’s fully

Removing the barricades

To love’s presence