Priory

& it was there,
kneeling in my soul to the
beauty of the abandoned priory,
the kind of beauty that sucks
the very breath from your throat,
that I realized the bitter truth,


I realized that all I loved
and would love forever
was leaving me -
and I could touch it no more,
at least not in this life,


I looked at you and saw the grief
of my impending departure
immolating your heart,
I decided to beg God just one
more time to let me stay,
'Please just let me stay'
and there, in the whispering
wind through empty, leafless trees,
my answer was whispered,


So I drank you as deeply as
I could,
mouth on yours, palm
cupping your face beneath the
facinorous entanglement of
tree-fingers,
You know the kind, the
ones that only a tornado can
comb through,


& I knew our tornado had only just
begun to pull us apart...