Aside: Watchful and omnipotent parent.

I walk on the morning and I sleep in the sunset.
I watch you.
I see you.

You little mouse.

Running among the reeds and grasses.
Picking at seeds.

I watch.

I play with stars and rest on mountains.
I catch you.
I hold you.

You little rabbit.

Rustling among the vine and weeds.
chewing on things.

I catch.

I sit atop the sun and stretch out galaxies.
I love you.
I want you.

You little lamb.

Wondering away to fields unknown.
Hiding among rock walls.

I love you.

When i am old...

I have come to hope that I would grow old in light provided. That my skin would loosen and toughen and read out like the farmers almanac. I pray that my bride and I will sit quietly on porch swings reading each others faces, searching for the history that we had created. I long for the times when third born generations will fill the halls and fields with laughter and hope and wrestling and love.

I have come to hope that I would grow old along side the sparrows that dwell around me. That my eyes would never forget the grace of a woman's smile or the smell of wet concrete in the summer. I pray that my bible would fall apart and that verse would flow from my mouth like honey from the comb. I long for the day when my bride and I will lie under cotton sheets on spring evenings and bring honor to the term 'heavenly love.'

I pray that when I am old and torn and a leathery mess that Father would come to me and say, "Come home young man, O sweetest son of mine. I have much so show you."

I have come to hope that when I am old...

Her straw hat.

The sun was bright in the noon sky as she worked. Her skin tanning from a tan base. I walked outside in my suit and watched her from the porch; I knelt behind a cedar pillar. She had not known that I would be coming home for a quick lunch. I watched her closely as though under a microscope. She was my experiment, she was my slide. I watched every pore and wrinkle and patch of her body move as she tilled the soil and planted the flowers.

She did all of this naked. She wore nothing but her straw hat.

I loved her then as I had in my youth. Not that I did not love her currently, but it was a youthful love. This youthful love was full of passion and desire and want. Forgiveness, anger, lust, bonding, gripping, friendship, hate, grace and peace. All of the things that verify love as love. These were the things that made me want to never leave her. They made me want to be near her always. They made me want to shackle my heart to hers. Forever.

She stayed near the earth, planting and digging and scratching away at the dirt. She was lovely.

Extravagant in the most simple of terms.

She was the Mother Earth.
She was my bride.

I watched her quietly for a few more moments and then slipped away back into the house through the french doors.

I grabbed my lunch and went back to the office. All the while thinking in my minds eye of the canvas that was her body; that was her skin.

That tan, golden siren that beckoned me to her.

My love. My all. Me.