Back Then I Had No Gift
Back then I had no gift but this precious love,
fashioned deep in the fierceness of my mind,
kept bright by you through every failing light.
Now, through each falling day and dying sound,
what's left is more than any time I've lost:
you outlive memory, vision, and desire.
Time itself has grown vast, unsearchable;
the world has multiplied your absence
into unlikely consolations for my soul.
To this very day, my heart remembers
and goes on beating out the faithful chords,
played steadily through all silence and noise.
You remain within me, securely sealed,
wider than memory, deeper than longing:
the persistent music of my dreaming life.
Christopher M. Swan, “Song of Susan,” 2008
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