INSTEAD

 INSTEAD

(FOR KYLE, ON OUR 20th ANNIVERSARY)

On our 20th anniversary,

I am laid up by a fall,

Cannot get out to buy a card,

Movement is an order tall.

With all the time that's hurried by,

I sit in awe and shake my head,

And pen a paean to the life

I have shared with you instead.

I write of travel, Paris, Rome, Quebec and Montreal.

Our myriad trips around the sun,

I have loved and savored all.

In my dreams I can revisit them,

Just cast my shells upon the sand,

I close my eyes and gladly go,

To Ireland or to Amsterdam.

Since my illness you have been,

My North Star ever bright,

Chasing down my walker,

Keeping me upright.

Praying I do not fall again, 

Harder for you than for me,

Putting up with the mockery and the tease,

Of this strange, savage disease

So in place of a card or a festive balloon,

How about years  of memories,

And a quiver of arrows to shoot out the moon?

I send to you a cavalcade,

Orchestrate a grand parade to get inside your head.

I will pen this paean to the love

I have shared with you instead.

-Bruce Potts

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