TENDER TERRITORY

Awaking to life’s kiss is a tender territory.
The blink of night’s shade lifts.
At the horizon’s edge, lips are half-opened, and awaiting.
A unfurling smile is a great effervescent swath of light
directing us toward our day.
This globe loans us fervent magnificence,
Steeped in intensity – lands, oceans, and skies rally.
Without pretension, nature enchants.
A chunk of forever is actualized – and becomes our very own.
We, the eavesdroppers, the voyeurs, the surveyors, and guests –
we debark from the cavernous wombs of destiny.
We, the passengers, those cosmic terrestrial folk,
those newly-minted life forms –
we eagerly spur our spirits.
And we thrust our bodies toward life’s love affair.
We interlace with both the finite and the infinite.
Once held inside a cradle’s miracle,
we now skip across the edges of earth,
and swim from shore to shore across the seas,
and wing a path through the air.
We canvass our salvation.
Migratory, with great compulsion to search, we drift.
From our start,
we have been shackled by those obtruding our freedoms.
For territory, we have fought, and been protective guardians.
We have influence, as good devotees of all.
We have crossed a thin rope – from canyon’s sides.
Within the arms of love,
we have also been cuffed
within the musculature of greed and hate.
We seek always to locate others – and ourselves.
For we are links of a golden fob,
chaining us to the luminous dial of existence.
Yet terra, sea, and endless space
have been sullied, trampled, obliterated, and destroyed.
We’ve committed betrayal, adultery, and murder of our planet.
We poach treasured gifts.
With gluttony, we’ve siphoned one another’s prosperity.
We’ve pilfered one another’s bounty.
Earth’s eternal crest is ablaze with immense splendor.
It asks nothing in return; demands nothing.
We clench tightly to each woven wrinkle of territory.
We drain the waves as seas lift and curl.
We poison precious morsels of air.
This home, our shelter, has long embraced us.
With crevices, curtains, and plush ecstasy as our coverlets,
we are clothed by all that is the globe.
We are nourished by each aquatic caress,
each shawl of vegetation,
and each breath pressed inside us.
Uniquely formed, tangible and intangible gifts are borrowed.
Our spindly planet of semi-hollow magic carries us
through the vastness of the heavens.
Our appetites are satiated with wild, salient views –
our internal treasury.
Nutrients for our imagination are rarely depleted.
We have made of earth our pincushion, punching bag,
and our experiment.
We unveil and forfeit the riches of this planet – for profit.
Weeping, I wonder why we haven’t understood our acts.
Our interchange might have been the reunion of our souls
with a tender territory.
We might have realized the truth earlier.
Earth is our lover.

COPYRIGHT: Kieran York

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Please check out my poetry in the latest, best-selling Sappho’s Corner Poetry Series:Wet Violets, Volume 2; and Roses Read, Volume 3. Edited by Beth Mitchum, the books are available through http:ultravioletlove.com and Amazon.

If you’re interested in romantic fiction, please consider the Lambda Award Finalist (2013) Appointment with a Smile by Kieran York. Books are available through www.bluefeatherbooks.com. Or order through Bella Book Distribution for books or e-books. Books and Kindle e-books are also available through Amazon.

And watch for the latest fiction release, this month – Careful Flowers!