Other Love Poems
(1976-1993)

Homing Device

To Pete,
To my dearest absent friend,
a thought,
thrown to the cosmos
from a curious present
with only faith as its fuel -
a formless projectile
with a homing device
called love.

Love Letter

Dear Peter,
I love you because your body
is a planet of delight.
Often, in that subtle state
between asleep and awake
I wander through its catalogue of treasures,
roaming across continents where the ground is firm
yet bursting with vitality,
or into secret gardens where the air is heavy
with the perfume of my privilege,
where desires stir
and marvellous plants grow at my loving touch.
Sometimes I venture into the very earth itself
down scented burrows
where your warmth hides a magic which makes me swoon.
Usually though
I am content to recline on sunny upland slopes
and contemplate the loveliness of this world
which is you.

Dear Peter,
I love you because your spirit
is a universe of gentleness.
Often too when walking
in an unimportant street
a thought of you alights like a butterfly -
I remember a kind word,
a loving look,
a radiant smile,
and I am overwhelmed with gratitude and humility
that I should have received so much from you
who asked nothing of me.
When with you I know peace
and live fully in the here and now
as we all should always, but seldom can
though it is our birthright.
Dear Peter,
I love you because I love you,
Dear Peter.

Tipping the Scale

Take my heart
and take my soul,
you superhuman lover.
Bonecracking
terrestrial orders
wave goodbye
to another
heartless hopeless teacher,
cracking the various juices
that easily tip the scale
with paramount certain uses,
you perpetual
beautiful
male.

Sweet Sorrow

A thousand miles away
we laughed on the seafront -
you grasped my hand,
dear man,
and said that your heart had burst
with grief
while the rain
plucked at the sea
and my tears
fell into the bay
a thousand miles away.

Rehearsal

Today the man I love
goes away.
While I rehearse his departure
in my heart
his spirit horse and tenderness -
my passionate desires -
surround me still,
making loving care conceivable
and absence endurable.
But today the man I love
goes away.

The Horses of Desire

Superhuman effort
tracking in the long grass
harnesses the horses of desire
easily dimming
dazzling circling golden rings
of insubstantial fire.
Lie down beside me now,
my superhuman lover,
take my heart and take my soul -
I will not run for cover.
Unleash your steeds of love,
consume my doubt and its power efface
with the incomparable wonder
of your superhuman grace.

Pete, my beloved

Pete, my beloved,
I love you darkly
by the light of the sun,
I love you brightly
when the full moon is one.
I love you gladly
in the glare of the light,
I love you madly
in the depths of the night.
Pete, my beloved.

23rd November 1993

Dear sweet, pure and perfect Pete,
Know that I love you still and always will.
On this your fortieth birthday (had you but lived)
I have only to close my eyes
to see your golden hair
as it would have been,
receding now to uncover more
of your magnificent forehead,
your smiling mouth and shining eyes,
your curly black and gleaming beard,
your face radiant, mature and wise.
Beloved friend,
I have loved you now for many more years
than the one and twenty required to prove devotion
without regretting a single moment
of magical significance I owe you,
or the wondrous chance
that brought you to my home
and my astonished unfolding heart.
For, dear, sweet Pete,
the gentle beauty of your mind and body,
your agile grace and comeliness,
your muscular tenderness,
your innocence and quiet strength,
have redeemed me
with the blessed blissful purity of perfect love.
Blessed Pete,
though now I lead a life
of brief manageable melancholy,
as must we all still undead,
I sometimes gaze on glory too.
For I know you are in that pure and perfect place
where the dismal daily distortions of busy terror
and the sacraments of everyday doubt
can no longer disturb the sacred beauty
of your blessed existence.